Caught in the Cabin
by livelikemusic441
Summary: Alberta walks in on Rose and Dimitri in the cabin which in turn keeps Dimitri from being turned. New ending to SK. Sass, romance, trouble making and Rose Hathaway. IC and much better then this new crap summary. Read and see for yourself!
1. Caught

The cabin scene at the end of SK. It never made sense for me that no one came to check on Rose and Dimitri for hours. I mean, how long did it take to escort some kids to the med clinic and I know they would have wanted roses story as soon as possible. Plus when I read the line that said something like "and if anyone came and found us this way, things would certainly get ugly" I thought it would be really funny. So here it is, and I also think this would lead to a different ending to SK (YAY) but disclaimer: I own nothing but the idea, all else belongs to Richelle Mead.

My skin burned where it touched his. It seemed impossible to me that a person could contain this much passion, love and wanting without exploding because I certainly seemed on the verge of it. The only articles of clothes separating us now were our undergarments and those were quickly coming off. Lissa told me that the first time hurts like hell, but even so, I couldn't seem to find the need to be scared. What did I care when I got to be with the most amazing man in the world and the love of my life.

Dimitri ran his hands down my back and wonderful warmth followed in their wake. I clutched him closer to me, if that was possible. As our kissing picked up even more, his hands moved up to the clasp of my bra, fumbling to remove it with shaking hands. Even though all this, my brain still registered hearing the distinct sound of a door opening. My breath caught in my throat and I pulled back to look Dimitri in the eye. His face portrayed all the shock and fear that I felt.

"BELIKOV!" A voice I recognized as Alerta's rang through the tiny cabin. "What the hell is going on here?!"

I'd never heard Alberta swear before, but I guess it wasn't everyday that you walked in on a student and her mentor getting it on when they were supposed to be getting said injured student cleaned up. I let my head fall back against the pillow with a sigh of resignation, but other than that, Dimitri and I hadn't come out of out shocked stupor enough to even move off each other.

I could imagine what Alberta saw- The majority of our clothes scattered on the floor, Dimitri on top of me with my legs wrapped around his waist, and us wrapped in each others embrace. Yeah… I don't think we were gonna be talking out way out of this one. All the terror we'd had during Victors trial about getting found out and now it happens? During one of our few moments of weakness? Something Divine hated us.

I saw wheels turning behind Dimitris eyes as he quickly evaluated all our options and then, recognizing defeat, he slowly sat up. I looked at Alberta in horror. Her mouth was hanging open in shock and she looked pissed, no scratch that, she looked more than pissed. She looked furious.

This was the first time I can ever remember actually being afraid of Alberta. Sure, when I'd been in trouble I'd been afraid of her punishment, but right then with her raging up a storm, she seriously looked like she was about to kick both mine and Dimitris asses. Until I realized that her eyes were only on Dimitri and they were filled with Disgust; I suddenly understood what she was thinking. In addition to Dimtri and I completely overstepping the bounds of our relationship, she thought that Dimitri had taken advantage of me. By now, Dimitri and I had got the sense to separate and were sitting on the edge of the bed, looking an awful lot like kids caught by their parents.

I jumped up to say something in Dimitris defense, but as soon as I opened my mouth to speak, Alberta cut me off.

"Clothes Miss Hathaway, Belikov, Now!" she snapped.

I was about to ignore her and start shouting anyways until I caught Dimtris eye, warning me to stay quiet. So Dimitri and I got dressed in silence, too scared to look at each other. When we were completely dressed again, Alberta finally spoke.

"Not that I can think of a fathomable explanation for any of this, I'm going to give you a chance to explain anyways. Sit down!" There was the fair Alberta I knew. Please let her understand, I prayed as Dimitri and I went to sit back on the bed. We had barely begun to sit when Alberta reached forward with the lightening speed of a highly trained guardian and grabbed Dimitri's arm.

"I don't think so, Belikov. You sit over there!" She pointed in the direction of the chair with the abandoned first aid kit still sitting upon it. What? Did she think that just having us both sitting on a bed would ignite some sort of explosion and we wouldn't be able to keep our hands off each other? Well in all honesty, I would normally agree, but we were in some serious shit right now and I don't exactly find that a turn on.

Once we were sitting, Alberta turned, as I knew she would, to face Dimitri first.

"Do you know how many rules you've broken here, Belikov? Moral and Ethical? Rose is your student and 7 years younger than you! You were supposed to be her mentor." She looked back and forth between the two of us. "Obviously you didn't adhere to those guidelines." She added dryly. "Do you want to tell me, Belikov, What is the world were you thinking?!"

Dimitri paused before answering to glance over at me. When he turned to Alberta again, it was with a defiant expression on his face, like he had just decided something.

"I was thinking about Rose," was all Dimitri said and if it left me confused I'm sure Alberta didn't find any significant meaning in his words.

"Obviously," she snapped. Since it didn't look like Dimtri was going to expand any more, Alberta continued her questioning.

"So how many times has this happened?" She demanded, looking over at me for the first time, sitting on the rumpled bed. I didn't know what, hopefully awesome, plan Dimitri had in mind so I didn't want to say anything to mess it up. I remained silent and kept an impassive face. Apparently Dimitri decided that our two practice room kisses didn't count as "this" because he answered: "Just this once… Unless you count the night that Vasalissa was kidnapped."

I could practically hear Alberta's brain kick into over drive as she tried to piece together what Dimitri had just said. After a few seconds of complete silence, she finally asked, "What… do you mean, Belikov?"

He took a deep breath and shut his eyes, before opening them to continue. "The spell that Victor put on Rose's necklace, well, it wasn't an attack spell."

"More rule breaking?" Alberta asked, aghast. "You lied under oath?"

Dimitri simply nodded.

"Why?!" She almost shouted, clearly at a loss for words.

This time when Dimtri answered her, he was looking straight at me with such an intensity, my skin felt like it might spontaneously combust.

"To protect Roza." He whispered.

Alberta wasn't quite sure how to respond this time. It looked as if she was replaying Dimitri's words in her head when she suddenly stiffened.

"You said it wasn't an attack spell," she began slowly, "so what kind of spell was it?"

I decided it was time to make my presence known in this room, I don't like being ignored and I knew the answer to this question.

"Lust," I piped up. Alberta looked at me with a mixed expression. "No, I'm sorry Miss Hathaway, you must be mistaken," she said with confidence.

"No," Dimitri cut in, "She's right."

I could tell that Alberta couldn't decide whether he was telling the truth or not. He two views of Dimtri were currently at war with each other. On one hand, she had Guardian Belikov, one of the best guardians she'd ever seen. And one the other hand, she had Dimitri Belikov, the man she'd just caught in a very compromising situation.

"It can't be," she pleaded, clearly not wanting to admit that we could actually have had legitimate feelings for each other this whole time and no one had noticed. Well, other than Victor Dashkov obviously. "For a lust spell to work, each person must already have feelings for the other. It doesn't create love or lust, it just removes inhibitions."

This, I already knew. Victor had told me as much when I went to go see him in lock-up, asking him to break it off.

Dimitri just looked as Alberta levelly and I saw understanding dawn on her face. I was beginning to feel like a spectator in the third degree of Dimitri and I didn't like it.

"Please Guardian Petrov," I began, "it was my fault, I pushed him." I said, thinking of that time when I kissed him in the practice room, which I was now feeling particularly horrible for.

Alberta turned to me with a glare so fierce, had I been anyone other than Rose Hathaway, I would have shrank back.

"Rosemarie," out comes the full name, "I don't care if you danced naked on his bed, Guardian Belikov should have known better."

Suddenly, my control just snapped. That seemed to be happeneing a lot today. First, beating up Jesse, then completely failing at staying away from Dimitri, and now I'm yelling at Alberta. Damn Lissa's darkness.

I jumped up so that I was looking eye to eye with her.

"What?" I yelled, "you don't think I can think for myself? That I don't know the difference between right and wrong? Just because Dimitri is older than I am does not mean he has any better control over how he feels that I do… This is completely unfair."

I wasn't done with my rant, not by a long shot, but even Rose Hathaway has to breathe. When I opened my mouth to continue, Dimtri cut me off.

"Roza, Stop!" he didn't say it any louder of more forcefully than when he normally spoke, but I heard the underlying order. I glared at him, but took his advice anyways and sat myself back down.

Alberta looked like she was going to explode. She had her hands pressed tightly on either side of her face as she exhaled a breath she had been holding with a whoosh.

"It all makes sense now," she said as she looked between the two of us, sounding resigned. "The way you both act around each other, why she would only ever listen to you, why you always stuck up for her, why you never minded being to one who had to deal with her." She made me sound like some crazy rabid animal that no one wanted to touch. I wasn't that bad. "And… oh god! All those private practice sessions.!"

"Wait!" Dimitri and I said at the same time. I shut my mouth and let him continue, knowing he was thinking the same as I was.

"Those were all business and practicing!" He swore.

"Is that ture?" she asked, looking at me.

"Yes, Guardian Petrov."

"I always knew you two were close, but I never thought…" she trailed off shaking her head. "Okay," she said, suddenly business like. "Here's how this is going to work." She turned to face Dimitri. "You, Belikov, will be reassigned."

"No!" I shouted just as Dimitri jumped to his feet. This proclamation seemed to have toppled his careful hold on self control. I didn't care that Alberta was watching, I didn't care that I might possibly get expelled, all I cared about was the possibility of Dimitri getting reassigned somewhere far away from me and I ran into his open arms and buried my face in his chest. He held me close and apparently didn't care that Alberta was watching either because he kissed my hair and murmured softly in Russian. All I caught was the use of Roza, my Russian name, a couple times.

"Excuse me!" Alberta shouted. "And I speak Russian, Belikov."

Dimitri kissed one once more on the forehead before turning to face Alberta with a fierce look on his face.

"Do you think I like this situation?" he asked, his voice raised. "Its horrible! We find our soul mates and were 7 years apart and forbidden from being anything more than friends. We tried to stay away, for the rules and for the princesses sake, but it didn't always work. We love each other and nothing is going to change that."

I was probably as shocked as Alberta. My Dimitri, a man of few words, had just practically made a speech.

"Please Alberta," I begged, "you have to understand! I promise we tried, but keeping love bottled up, it hurts. It eats at you from the inside until it feels like you have nothing left!"

"Well," she said, after a long moment of silence, "This changes things."

I reached out and took Dimitris hand as she deliberated. He squeezed it gently.

Finally, Alberta spoke again. "This is what's going to happen," she repeated softly. "You can both stay."

She didn't get to finish because at that moments I rushed forward and threw my arms around her thanking her to the ends of oblivion and beyond. Then I froze as my mind caught up with my actions. I released her and backed up slowly, afraid I had made her mad again, but Alberta had a faint glimmer of a smile on her face.

"But," she continued, "All private practice sessions will be monitored by me and there will be no more of this," she paused and pointed at the bed, "until Rose graduates."

A selfish part of me wanted to whine, graduation was so far away, but in reality, these were good terms. No, these were wonderful terms. All the things Dimitri and I feared would happen, had actually happened and everything was ok. The sky didn't fall and both of us still had our careers. I was over joyed that I simply turned towards Dimitri, without thinking, and threw myself at him. He picked me up like I weighed nothing and held me to him as we kissed in celebration. When we broke apart I turned towards Alberta with a sheepsish grin on my face.

"Starting now?" I asked. At that, Alberta actually laughed.

As Dimitri and Alberta walked and I skipped back to campus, Alberta stopped being Guardian Petrov for just a moment and was just plain old Alberta, our friend. She wore a bemused expression that older people so often wore around young couples so obviously in love. I stopped my skipping and happy chatter for a moment to grab Dimitris hand and pull his head down to my level.

"Did you really mean all that, Comrade?" I whispered in his ear. He stopped walking to put his hand on my cheek and nod. Alberta had also stopped walking when she noticed that we had fallen behind, but seeing us in the middle of a whispered conversation, kept walking until she was out of earshot.

"Of course," Dimitri replied, "I hate pretending like I don't love you, Roza."

I smiled: "I love you too!"

He brought my hand up to his mouth and brushed his lips across my fingers. And just like that we slipped comfortably back into place. When we reached the Dhampir dorm, Dimitri gave me a quick peck on the cheek, earning him a disapproving look from Alberta. It was at that moment that I saw Mason, flickering in and out of focus with that same sad look on his face.

Ok in my version, since Alberta busted in and broke up rose and dimitris little romantic escapade, its a lot shorter in the cabin and theyre already back at the dorms when mason shows up and Alberta, being always prepare, has a radio. Thus the guardians are super fast at reacting and save lots of time. And when the strigoi reach the heart of campus, the guardians are ready. Therefore no hostages are taken and no rescue mission and no dimitri turned strigoi :]

My ending to shadow kiss.

Review please!

~LLM


	2. Strigoi

**AN: so some people submitted reviews to ask me to continue and I have :]. At the moment I have about 3 chapters written to post, but I need ideas for what you all would like to happen in it. Please review and let me know! Not much happens but I just wanted to get a chapter posted tonight for you all. Hope you like it.**

My hand flew up to cover my mouth and stifle a cry of surprise. Mason had never appeared in front of other people before, save for Stan, or depending if your one of the "Rose is Crazy" supporter, I had never hallucinated in front of this many people before.

Alberta and Dimitri both noticed my sudden change as I let the open door fall closed again.

"Rose, what are you doing?" Dimitri asked from behind me. I could tell from his voice that he was worried.

"Do you see him?" I hissed to the two of them, pointing towards Mason's flickering outline. "It's Mason." He looked a little frustrated, but mostly scared. What would a ghost have to be afraid of?

Dimitri put a hand on my shoulder, "Come on, Rose, lets go inside, it's late."

I shook him off. "Damn it! This isn't lack of sleep of stress! And I am not crazy!"

Mason opened his mouth and looked like he was trying desperately to speak.

"Mas. What is it?" I pleaded with him. He tried to speak again and then resigned to point towards the woods where we had come from. I turned to look, but still saw nothing.

"I don't understand! What's out there Mason?" Dimitri and Alberta exchanged a worried look, probably about my mental stability, but I ignored it. "What's wrong?"

And with what looked like an enormous effort, Mason finally formed words.

"They're coming."

I could only think of one "they" that we would need warning about and suddenly I understood why Mason had looked scared.

"Strigoi?" I gasped out and, very solemnly, Mason nodded before fading away.

"Holy Shit!" I whipped around to face Dimitri and Alberta. "There are strigoi on campus!" Neither of them moved.

"Rose… I don't think…" I cut Alberta off.

"I'm not crazy!" I shouted, yet again. "I know I'm not," I said, rounding on Dimitri. "I told you about Anna."

Dimitri hesitated, not sure if me absorbing Lissa's darkness proved that I could see ghosts or caused me to imagine them. Finally, seeing the desperation on my face, he gave in. "Okay, Rose, I'll go check everything out."

Alberta looked exasperated. "Really, Belikov, this is hardly necessary."

I was about to tell her to stop being an idiot and let us go have a look, but Dimitri spoke first. "Actually, I think it might be," he said, "something doesn't feel right." Then he turned to me. "I'll be back soon."

"Wait!" I shouted, "I know I'm right. You can't go out there alone."

He placed his hands on my shoulder and looked at me levelly. "You have to stay here with Guardian Petrov." He must have know that I was about to protest because he quickly added, "someone will need to sound the alarm." I couldn't argue there.

"And I'll take a radio," he assured me.

At that, Alberta disappeared inside for no more than ten, she reappeared handing Dimitri a radio. She seemed to accept that something was indeed wrong because a second later she handed me a stake. With one final look at us, mainly me, Dimitri sprinted off the way we had come and as soon as I couldn't see him anymore, I began to pace. Alberta stood stiffly against the wall.

Suddenly, her radio crackled to life.

"Petrov, Its Belikov. Can you hear me?"

"Yeah, Petrov here. Go ahead," she responded, gripping the talk button tightly.

"Rose was right," came Dimitri's voice again and I wanted to shout _I know!_ "There's a lot of foot prints out here and judging by the length of the strides, they were moving fast. Sound there alarm and I'm going to go try and find them. I wonder how in the world they…" he cursed in Russian."

"Buria." He whispered, deadly calm into the radio before static took over.

My breath hitched and I snatched the radio from Alberta's frozen hands. "Go sound the alarm," I practically shouted at her, "didn't you hear him?"

She snapped out of her shocked state and darted back in the back door to the dhampir dorms. I pressed the talk button on the radio down with shaking hands and managed to choke out Dimitri's name. There was nothing but static in response.

If he died, I didn't know what would happen to me. He was the other half of my soul. I had always been independent and strong and I was going to protect Lissa from strigoi, even if it killed me. That had been my plan until I met Dimitri. I had never needed anyone as much as I needed Dimitri and if he died, the one person I leaned on would be gone. I would collapse. But I was a guardian. I didn't have time to worry about anyone when moroi lives were at risk. This was my life, no matter how much I wished it wasn't at the moment. I wanted to just screw the Moroi, except maybe Lissa, Christian and Adrian (yes even Adrian) and just run off with Dimitri to somewhere safe. Somewhere where we didn't have to worry about constant attacks everyday. This was reality thought, and I needed to focus if I was going to get through this alive.

Swallowing my worries, I pressed the talk button with new resolve.

"Dimitri, if you can hear me, you listen up. Don't you dare let anything happen to yourself. You stay safe you hear me?" Even as I said the words through, I knew that Dimitri's own life meant little to him in a situation like this. He would fight to the death if it meant keeping others safe. So, I hit below the belt and played on his inability to say no to me.

"You stay safe for me. I need you to come back, Comrade. I love you." There was nothing else to do except hope at that point. I couldn't afford to panic right then though. There was probably a giant pack of strigoi coming to attack the school and I needed to focus.

**AN: again: so there was chapter two. Just a small taste of whats to come. Review and let me know what you thought of it please. And ideas?**

**~LLM**


	3. Saving Fireboy

**AN: Hi everyone, chapter 2 here. This isn't beta'ed so any mistakes are mine. I try to proofread as best I can but some always seem to slip through and I apologize. Also I need some ideas. I know where I want the story to go eventually but can I get some ideas for just small events of fluffy things to add in? I would be soooo grateful if you all would send some ideas my why and when I write it I shall dedicate the chapter to you for you brilliant idea :]**

**Please please review. I love constructive criticism and to know what you all are thinking.**

**I own nothing cept the idea (obviously I mean I'm on fanfiction)**

With steely reserve, I turned to face Albert, emerging from the dorms again.

"What do you need me to do?"

She looked at me fiercely. "You go help in the novice's dorm. Help the guardians organize and fight if the building is breeched."

I spared her a curt nod, before sprinting off to the front of the building where the guardians were likely to be congregating. The melting snow was soaking my clothes, but I didn't care. All around me, I saw guardians rushing about efficiently, some tell tale signs that Alberta had indeed notified the whole school. Bars were being slammed down across windows that I hadn't even known existed before now.

An announcement came over the intercom and I could here the subtle panic in Kirova's voice. "Student, may I have you attention. This is not a drill. Our campus is under attack. Please return to your dorms immediately and do not…"

I was sucked into Lissa's head. Eddie was with her and I was thankful that the strigoi chose to attack during field experience. Adrian was sitting next to Lissa on her bed and patting her back while she cried. It didn't take me long to figure out why from her thoughts. She and Christian were supposed to meet in the chapel, but she had gotten caught by the lockdown and Christian was out there alone.

"He'll be safe in the chapel, it's holy ground." Eddie spoke from where he was keeping watch in the corner and Lissa choked on a sob.

"What if he was on his way back because of the announcement and he gets caught outside? And oh god… Rose!" a twinge of guilt flashed through the bond. She'd spent all this time crying about Christian and had only just remembered about me. I wanted to tell her not to bother, that this is what I'd been training for my whole life, but… stupid one way bond.

It didn't matter though because Adrian was thinking the same thing. "Rose can take care of herself and I heard that she was with Belikov."

Eddie nodded in agreement. "Yeah, after she just about killed Jesse, Guardian Belikov took her away to get her calmed down."

Adrian gave a humorless laugh, "I pity the strigoi that picks on the two of them." This made Lissa feel a little bit better, but did nothing to help her worry over Christian.

When I finally yanked myself out of Lissa's head, I knew without a doubt what I had to do: disobey Alberta and go after Christian.

It didn't matter that it was just field experience, Christian was my charge and he could possibly be in danger, so turning away from the dhampir dorm, I jogged off towards to chapel, stake in hand and nerves in edge. Something moved stealthily off to my left. I didn't think, only reacted and my stake came to a halt just above Christian's chest.

"God! Christian! I just almost killed you! Why didn't you call out you idiot?" I whispered angrily and I reshethed my stake.

"Well I didn't want to just waltz over to you incase you were strigoi..." he shot back.

"If I were strigoi you'd be dead right now. You aren't exactly James bond." I spat back and he gave me a dry chuckle.

Suddenly my stomach clenched and rolled. "somethings not right" I told Christian as I pulled out my stake. That's when the strigoi grabbed me and I was thrown backwards into the trunk of a tree. "hide" I gasped out, hoping that Christian heard me.

(cut to the fight scene from the book because I really don't want to rewrite that whole chapter and I don't have the ebook to copy and paste from. So just go back and read that chapter of shadow kiss if you get confused)

Sweat dripped from my face as I drew close to Christian and searched for the next threat.

"It's over. They left." a soft voice spoke from behind me and I whirled to see Dimitri pointing towards the lightening sky in the east.

It wasn't until just then that I let the panic I'd been keeping locked up burst forth and be satiated. I quickly looked Dimitri over, searching for any serious injuries. He had a cut lip and what looked like they would be some wicked bruises the next day but that was it.

I breathed a sigh of relief. He was okay. The strigoi had fled. And, I checked the bond real quick, Lissa was fine. We had all made it.

So with out a second thought, I threw myself into dimitris arms, not caring that we were standing right next to Christian and that there were probably other guardians around. All that mattered was that we had both made it through the strigoi attack alive.

As my arms wrapped around him, Dimitri stiffened from shock, and to be honest I was shocked with myself too. All our hard work to stay apart and not get caught and I was going to ruin it all right here. Dimitri wrapped his arms around me, after he over came the shock of having his secret girlfriend ( if that's what I was) throw herself at him, pressed his face to my hair and held me close.

It was a beautiful moment until Christian cleared his throat loudly, "excuse

Me!"

He looked at us with eyebrows raised. Dimitri immediately released me and stepped away, his guardian mask that I hated so much slipping back on. I suppressed the urge to glare at Christian. Instead I turned towards him with a smile and asked him if he needed anything, in the sweetest voice I could muster.

He glanced between Dimitri and I once more before shaking his head and replying, "uh yeah. I'd like to see Lissa."

This is just what I need. Someone to find our so close to graduation, I though, but I brightened at the mention of Lissa. I glanced at Dimitri and he nodded as if to tell me to go. I gave him a warm smile and told him, "I'll find you later comrade," before turning to walk off with Christian.

We didn't talk at first, but Christian kept giving me sidelong glances. My earlier ecstatic mood was beginning to bubble into a wave of annoyance.

"What?" I snapped at Christian, "are you gonna actually say something or gape at me all day? I know I'm attractive, but seriously Christian, you're dating my best friend."

He opened his mouth and closed it a few times, but scowled at me when I started to imitate him. "Ok Rose, you really wanna know what I'm thinking?" he asked, and I nodded. "Fine, what the fuck was that?"

"What was what?" I asked, keeping my face smooth and hoping I could convince him be was being ridiculous.

He looked at me incredulously. "Don't mess with me rose. You know exactly what I'm talking about."

I wasn't about to make this easy for him, so I just kept walking, eyes straight ahead, but Christian was nothing if not stubborn.

"I'm talking," he confirmed, "about you throwing yourself into Belikov's arms back there."

I scoffed. "You're making kind of a big deal about this aren't you? I was just glad he was okay. He _is_ my mentor ya know."

Christian didn't say anything, he just looked at me.

"It was just a hug," I tried again, "what are you? In second grade?"

He rolled his eyes, "I know you've seen enough through Lissa's head to know that I am definitely not in second grade."

I gagged, bur appreciated his attempt to lighten the mood.

"Look, Rose," he said more seriously, "do you remember when I told Lissa I knew about her compulsion," I nodded. "Do you remember what I said?" he asked me.

"uh vaguely..." I didn't see where this was going.

"I told her that I saw everything because it's easy when no one notices you. Well, I still notice everything."

When did Christian become so wise? I wasn't about to tell him that thought.

I was saved from answering because we had just arrived at Lissa's door. And then I couldn't even speak let alone see because Lissa's blonde hair was covering my face and she hugged me with all if her strength.

**AN: so I know not too much happens in this chapter but its necessary. The next chapter, rose and Dimitri are found out. Dun dun dun… **

**Remember: ideas and review please :] (I really don't want to set a number to reach before my next chapter, but I need your help guys and I wanna know what youre thinking.)**

**~LLM**


	4. When Your Friends Find Out

**So here's the next chapter. I'll be on vacation for 2 weeks but I already have the next chapter to post when I get back. Enjoy :]**

**Not Beta'd and the usual disclaimers. I don't own the characters, Richelle Mead does. **

**Thank you so much to everyone who favorited, reviewed and story alerted me last chapter! It means a lot!**

"We're ok Liss," I whispered to her as I rubbed her back soothingly.

Lissa pulled back to look at me with tear streaked cheeks. "Oh Rose! I was so worried about you! What if you had been killed?" she cried slightly hysterical.

"Well I wasn't now was I? Calm down Liss, it's all over." I told her with a roll of my eyes. That's when she noticed Christian and flung herself at him with a shriek.

Then both Christian and I were violently yanked into Lissa's room. First my eyes fell on Eddie. He was standing in the corner still looking like he could take on an army of strigoi. When he saw me however, his face split into a grin.

"Rose!" he came forward and gave me a brotherly hug, "You're ok!"

"Course I am," I scoffed, "No strigoi is taking me out!"

And then I heard a whispered "little dhampir" from the corner and turned to see Adrian's panic stricken face. He stood silently and crossed the room to pull me into a bone crushing hug, or as bone crushing as a moroi can do.

I grunted uncomfortably. "Adrian," I told him soothingly, "I'm okay."

He pulled back and gave me a kiss on the forehead and I stood there awkwardly, suppressing the urge to pull away. I knew he had been worried about me and I didn't want to ruin his moment.

Sensing my discomfort, Lissa cleared her throat. "Rose will you _please_ let me heal you?" she must have known I would fight her on this.

"Lissa, I'm fine! I don't even feel anything. Don't waste it on me." the last thing I wanted was more darkness. All I needed was a long sleep.

Lissa rolled her eyes and took a step towards me, which I mirrored backwards. "It's not a waste," she said, "I want to heal you."

Lissa gave someone over my shoulder a significant look and I felt Eddie's arms wrap around me, restraining. I struggled, but it was fruitless. I was exhausted and Eddie was strong.

Lissa put a palm up to my face and I felt the magic swell through our bond. My whole body changed temperature a few times as the wonderful feelings of spirit began to fade and all the aches and injuries I hadn't realized had been bothering me so much were now gone.

Eddie released me and I turned to scowl at him. "You all planned that, didn't you?" He just shrugged and smiled. "You guys suck!" I said, grumpily to Lissa, but she was already reaching for Christian who and collapsed on her bed. I had forgotten how tiring magic was for moroi.

I felt her magic through the bond again, and silently said a thank you as I found no darkness left behind.

"Thanks" Christian mumbled, reaching up to hold Lissa's hand against his face. Watching Lissa and Christian together reminded me with a pang of Dimitri and suddenly with him was where I wanted to be, even more than here with my friends. Looking at everyone, I was incredibly glad that they were all safe, but that one hug out on the quad just wasn't enough Dimitri for me. What I needed right now was to see him.

"Hey Liss?" I called, tearing her attention from Christian for a moment.

"Yeah?" She asked, looking up at me.

"I'm pretty tired," I told her, adding in a yawn for good measure, "I'm just gonna go check on some stuff and go to bed."

I could feel her wondering through the bond her wandering what stuff I could possibly have to do right after a strigoi attack, but she could tell how tired I was so she let me go with out questions.

I gave everyone a hug goodbye, except Christians was more like a one armed pat on the shoulder because he was too tired to get up.

Once in the hallway, I stared around me, trying to decide where I should look for Dimitri. Finally I decided on the gym, seeing as that was pretty much mine and Dimitri's domain, when I felt a wave of confusion hit me through the bond.

Curious, I slipped into Lissa's head as I started for the gym.

She was trying to figure out why I had run out of her room so fast and she decided to voice her confusion to the others.

"I wonder what was so important, Rose had to run off like that," she mused.

Eddie shrugged, not too worried about it. Adrian looked out the window, as of he was trying to see me walking across the quad.

Thank god I was in Lissa's head because I was just about to step out of the moroi dorm at that moment and I stopped myself. It wasn't a secret that I was going to the gym, I just didn't want Lissa to start asking me why, so I hung out inside the doors and waited for the all clear.

Back in Lissa's head, Christian mumbled something unintelligible from the bed that sounded like "shugonasee beblekov."

Lissa walked over to Christian, confused when suddenly Adrian chimed in. "Hey! Looks like Rose is heading to the gym."

Damn it, I mentally cursed. I'd thought that Adrian had stopped looking out the window by now.

"That's why I was saying," Christian said, lifting himself up off the pillow. Eddie snorted as if to say, those were words? But Christian ignored him and continued. "I said, she's going to see Belikov."

I felt myself/Lissa frown. "Why?"

Christian finally sat up all the way, looking alert. "I don't know. I just heard her tell him that she'd see him later after the strigoi fled."

Everyone was silent for a moment and Lissa noticed Adrian was scowling, but before she could ask what was wrong, Christian spoke again.

"Something else weird happened," he said tentatively.

"What do you mean?" Lissa asked, taking his hand.

Christian stared at the wall as he began to speak. "There was this moment after the fight was over when Rose and Belikov kinda... I don't even know," he sighed and ran his free hand through his hair.

Lissa saw Adrian's scowl become more pronounced. "What?" she asked glancing between the two of them and feeling like she was missing out on a huge secret.

Christian grimaced, " well when Belikov came over to tell us it was all over, rose kinda like ran up to him and threw her arms around him."

Lissa immediately began rationalizing this in her head, even though this struck her as odd, especially for me.

"First," Christian continued, "Belikov looked surprised, like he didn't know what to do, but then he hugged her back."

"That's not weird!" Lissa was defending me and I could have kissed her.

"No, you weren't there Liss. He like had his face in her hair," he gestured to Lissa's shoulder covered by her long blonde hair, "It was like they way you'd hug your girlfriend."

"Oh..." Lissa trailed off, "that is a little weird." Damn that fireboy.

Eddie looked like he didn't believe a word of it but Adrian's scowl has grown even bigger, if that was possible. Lissa glanced at Eddie, trying to decide if she should interrogate Adrian in front of him, because it was obvious Adrian knew something.

Please don't! I silently begged. Damn one way bond. If my secret was going to come out, I would prefer as few people know as possible and especially not Eddie. He had been Masons best friend and I didn't know how he would take Masons almost girl friend sneaking around with a teacher.

Lissa, thankfully, decided to wait until the three of them were alone, but she was impatient to get her questions answered.

She placed a hand on Christians shoulder. "It's late guys, and I'm sure your all tired. Christian you can just stay here for the night."

Christian mumbled a thanks and Eddie and Adrian rose to leave, but at a pointed look from Lissa Adrian hung behind.

It was a good thing that I had learned to still function while in Lissas head, so I wouldn't be standing out on the quad like an idiot, but there was no way I would miss this.

Back in the dorm, Lissa eyes Adrian warily. "Adrian... What do you know?"

In Adrian's defense, he looked like this was the last place he wanted to be right now. He didn't want to betray me but he knew that Lissa would never let him go until he gave up what he knew. I actually felt bad for him and I wished I could tell him to go ahead and save him self from Lissa's wrath.

"Nothing?" he tried, knowing it wouldn't work.

Lissa wasn't fooled. "So why were you scowling?"

With a grimace Adrian, still tried to save my secret. "It's nothing," he told her, "I just don't like the cradle robbing mentor." and then he slapped a hand over his mouth, realizing what had just slipped out. He was so used to calling Dimitri that to me that I think he'd forgotten exactly what it meant and why he'd started calling Dimitri that in the first place.

"Cradle robbing..." Lissa repeated slowly, and then suddenly she realized what he was implying. "Wait!" she screeched, her voice shooting up an octave, "Rose is sleeping with Guardian Belikov?" Even Christian sat up at that.

"Well I don't know about that," Adrian said, looking guilty, "but there is definitely something going on with them."

_**To CaRiNeSs:**_** when I told you that your idea would be used next chapter I had forgotten that I already wrote like 3 that I had yet to post so it will be in the next chapter I write, but not the next one I post. Thanks for helping me out :]**

**And thank you to **_**4ev3rsilenc3d**_** also for another great idea that will be used later in the story.**

**Im still looking for more ideas so help me out please! (and Im doing requests)**

**Also I love to know what everything is thinking so review please!**

**~LLM**


	5. Busted

**AN: I'm back! School had been sooo hectic and im on the cross country team so free time has been at about a 0. Im updating right now from journalism class so don't tell my teacher. Thanks soooo much for all the reviews and favs! **

**I don't own the characters**

"Rose told you but not me?" I could hear the hurt and anger in Lissa's voice and feel it through the bond. Adrian immediately back tracked.

"She didn't exactly _tell_ me. I kinda walked up during a pretty heated argument between them back at the ski lodge where I met you guys." he looked at Lissa sheepishly. "Rose tried to deny it but one look at their auras and it was obvious."

Lissas mind felt like it was stuck in quick sand. This had been going on since Christmas and probably before and she never knew. All she could think was why didn't I tell her. She was hurt that I didn't trust her and she was worried that I would get myself into something like this. If only she knew the whole story.

"What were they arguing about?" Christian suddenly asked.

Adrian ran a hand through his hair, thinking hard. "Well I walked up in the middle of it, but Rose said something like 'you and Tasha are perfect together. I know how much you like women that aren't your own age. Tashas like 8 years older than you and I'm like 7 years younger than you.' and Belikov was seriously pissed off and he said something like 'and every moment you keep talking you prove how young you really are."

Lissa gasped in indignation. She couldn't believe that Dimitri would talk to me like that. In his defense, I was acting horrible to him and Tasha and he'd probably had all my attitude he could handle for that week. Repressing feelings doesn't help with your mood either.

Adrian chuckled softly. "Yeah, Rose looked like Belikov had just slapped her in the face. But you should have seen his face when Rose touched my arm and walked off with me. The phrase if looks could kill came to mind."

"I always got the feeling that Rose never liked Aunt Tasha very much, but I could never figure out why. Guess know we know. They were going after the same guy. I wonder if Tasha knows about Rose and Belikov" Christian mused.

Lissa had yet to speak and Adrian wad just standing in the corner looking awkward.

Lissa was going to be hell to deal with later, but it seemed the action has died down so I pulled back into my own head and entered the gym. I guess the cats out of the bag.

And the gym was... Empty. No Dimitri.

I turned and punched on of the near by dummies that someone had left out. I was thankful though because a dummy was better than the wall. Since Dimitri wasn't in the gym, that meant he was probably in his room. Guardians were still swarming all over campus so it was going to be a real bitch to get up there unnoticed. Damn him, why didn't he think of this. It was moments like these when I really wish I had a phone. Maybe that's what I would ask Lissa for for Christmas.

I kicked the dummy once more for good measure before turning and stalking out of them gym. I knew my frustration was irrational, but that didn't make it go away. I'd been through an emotional roller coaster in the past few hours and my nerves were beyond frayed. First I went from nearly having sex with Dimitri, to thinking we were both going to be kicked out, to thinking he was dead and all I wanted was to freaking see him right now. Maybe all that healing was getting to Lissa and I after all.

After taking a deep calming breath, I pushed the door to the dhampir dorms and peeked around. No body paid me any attention so I walked across the lobby and up the staircase that lead to the guardian wing like I had every right to be there. Somehow I remembered which door was Dimitri's from the night of the lust spell, which I found a miracle in and of it's self because I had been a little distracted that night.

I knocked softly on his door, loud enough for anyone inside to hear, but not so loud that it would draw attention to me trying to get into my mentors bedroom. After about 30 seconds and Dimitri still had yet to answer, I knocked again then put my ear up to the door to listen for movement. Still nothing.

"Comrade... It's Rose! Open up!" I hissed through the door. After another moment, I smacked my palm against the door in frustration. What can I say, a patient person I am not.

"Where the fuck are you, Dimitri?" I asked his door. Needless to say, I didn't get a response.

Sleep was finally catching up with me, so with a yawn I set off back to my dorm room, extremely disappointed. If I was going to get hounded to no end by Lissa tomorrow morning, I was going to need my sleep.

As I stalked through the lobby, I probably had my "I'm going to kill someone" face on because people kept shooting me weird looks. I didn't even notice until I nearly trampled Alberta on my way up the Students staircase.

"Shit, sorry!" I gave her a small smile and she shot me a stern look at my language slip. I was about to turn and leave when an idea stuck me. I felt so stupid for not thinking of immediately.

"Um, Guardian Petrov?" maybe I was imagining it, but there was something in Alberta's lined face that told me she already knew what I was going to ask, which she proved a moment later.

"Do you know where Guardian Belikov is?" I asked. She let out a sigh and gave me an exasperated look.

"Rose, it's past curfew. Just go to bed and you can find him in the morning."

I said I would but I got the feeling she didn't believe me. Funny because I was actually going to bed this time. My legs started feeling heavier and heavier as I dragged myself down the hall to my room. Surprisingly, my key was still in my pants pocket after everything that happened. When I put it in the lock and turned, there was no loud click when the tumblers caught and unlocked the door. Odd, I though and I immediately felt more alert.

Turning the knob, I realized it was indeed unlocked when I distinctly remembered locking my door this morning. A thousand horror situations ran though my head, each more unlikely than the next. There were strigoi hiding in my room, an ax murderer had come to get me.

My hand on the stake that no one had asked me to give back, I threw the door open and it smacked the wall opposite, probably waking somebody up, but I didn't care.

There was a familiar brown haired figure sitting in my desk chair looking at me intently. I quickly composed myself and leaned on the door frame, crossing my arms across my chest.

"I distinctly remember telling you that _I_ would find _you_ later, Comrade, not break into my room."

**Review tell me what you think? **

**Nicia: ill email you the next chapter can you send me your email again?**

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**LLm**


	6. A Night With Dimitri

**AN: thank you all soo much for all the reviews and favorites and thank you to everyone who pointed out that I accidentally pasted the chapter from my email twice into my word doc. So sorry about that. To make up for it im posting an extra long chapter a week ahead of time. Hope you all like it. and I also fixed the last chapter and reuploaded it **

**I don't own it. **

**This chapter is dedicated to **_**CaRiNeSs**_** her idea is used in this chapter so thank her for it :]**

Dimitri rose from desk chair with a chuckle and pulled me into the room. "I think it'd be best to keep the door shut while I'm in here."

I attempted to raise an eyebrow at him, as my mind immediately went to the gutter. He shook his head at me but pulled me into a hug.

"Nice abuse of power, by the way." I mumbled into his shirt. "How do you think Alberta would like it if she knew you were using your master key to break into student's rooms?" I joked, pulling back to look at his face.

A rare full smile split his face, "Not much more than she likes me having a romantic relationship with a student, I'd guess." he whispered, before leaning sown to give me a heated kiss which left me breathless.

When he pulled away, I stood on my tip toes in an attempt to follow him and keep my lips on his, but he just put his hands on my shoulders and pushed my back down. I stuck out my lower lip and crossed my arms over my chest. His chuckle washed over my face as he took in my child like appearance.

"Come on Rose, I know your tired. You should get changed for bed."

He did have a point. "Yeah taking on an army of strigoi does take a lot out of you," I said with a yawn as I collected my pajamas off the floor.

I was about to head to the bathroom to change when I decided, what the heck, it's not like this is anything he hasn't seen before. However, as soon as I pulled my shirt over my head, Dimitri turned away to look at my wall. Always the gentleman. When I had pulled my sleeping shirt over my head and slipped on a pair of shorts, I suddenly wished I had invested in some sort of sexy matching sleep set from Victoria's Secret or something, but I never would have guessed at this turn of events and that Dimitri would be in my room tonight.

"It's ok to look now, Comrade," I told him and when he turned around, I added in a whisper, "not that you couldn't have looked before."

"Mmm," he replied, "I don't think that would be a good idea seeing as we both need to sleep," but he pulled me into his arms anyways. "I was so worried about you." he whispered into my hair.

"Please, Comrade," I said repeating my earlier joke, "no strigoi is taking me out."

Rather then start crying or some other embarrassing form of emotional display, I decided to crack a joke. "You better not die, or else I might have to start dating Adrian."

Dimitri sounded as if he was choking and I laughed at him.

"I love you," he said randomly. I was taken back by his openness. Dimitri was never like this. I knew he loved me, but he wasn't one to overuse the words. I pulled back to study his face.

He arched an eyebrow curiously at me and I was immediately jealous. He still had to teach me how to do that, along with curse in Russian. He didn't have to speak. I knew what he was wondering with out words.

"You seem different," I said as he ran his hands down my back.

"Why is that?" He dipped his head to skim his lips across my throat and I struggled to keep my train of thought.

"I, um... Okay this, for example. Normally you're all 'hands to yourself' even when we're alone and now you're... Not." I finished lamely and he immediately stopped his ministrations on my neck.

"What? Don't stop!" His breath tickled my neck as he chuckled. "I wasn't complaining, just wondering what brought it on."

He stood upright and looked at me seriously, like he always did and I tucked a stray piece of hair behind his ear.

"There was a moment after the fighting was over and I couldn't find you. I thought you had died." his guardian mask was starting to slip. "We have a dangerous job and I don't want to waste another minute with you trying to stay away."

I couldn't keep the massive grin off my face before I leaned in and kissed him on the lips. He responded eagerly and pulled my body flush against his. Finally, when we were both gasping for breath, he pulled away and rested his forehead against mine.

"Wow," I joked, "All it took was for me to almost die. If this is what I'm going to get in return, I should pick fights with strigoi more often."

"Absolutely not," he growled, still smiling and he tackled me backwards on to the bed. I still didn't know what to make of this new playful Dimitri because it was so opposite of his normal stance on us, but that didn't mean I wasn't going to take advantage of it.

"Only if you promise not to," I joked as I leaned in to kiss him. He smiled against my lips and hummed in delight. Like all kisses between us, no matter how innocent this one may have started out as, it quickly became passionate and deep. I tugged at the bottom of his shirt, wanting it off last week, when suddenly he yanked away from me.

I tried to follow him up and drag his lips back to mine, but, again, it was hopeless. He was just so much stronger than me.

"Dimitri, where the heck do you think your going? You still owe me from the cabin earlier."

"Oh Roza," he chuckled, "I don't think we shouldn't be doing this when we're both injured and need rest."

"What? Oh yeah!" I immediately felt guilty. "Lissa healed me... I kinda forgot." He winced slightly as I reached up to stroke a forming bruise and his cut lip. That couldn't have felt good while we were kissing.

"And Alberta just let us off the hook today," he pointed out, "we should behave for at least one day."

"Are you kidding me?" I scowled at him. "We behaved every other day except yesterday!"

He kissed my pouting lip. "She was very generous with us and I don't want to abuse that the very night she let us off the hook."

"You know that's really stupid logic right?" I asked him.

"Well it would make me feel better."

"You and your stupid morals," I huffed, but unwrapped my legs from his waist and flopped back on the bed anyways. I looked at him curiously when he laid down next to me.

"That doesn't mean I have to leave."

I immediately rolled on top of him and buried my face in his chest. "That is the best news I've heard all day!" And I felt him chuckle beneath me. After that, I fell asleep almost immediately, the exhaustion finally catching up with me

When I woke the next morning, I was ready to leap out of bed and rush off to practice in order to make it on time when I remembered that my mentor was lying right next to me and not waiting for me to rush into the gym shouting apologies. Before I could reach over Dimitri to shut my alarm off, he shut it off for me and tightened his arms around my waist.

"Mmm, you stayed!" I mumbled into his chest. I hadn't moved since I had fallen asleep. He just stroked my hair, which I'm sure looked like a dead animal, and kissed my head.

Sadly, I rolled out of his embrace and stretched. "We should get going."

In a surprising move, Dimitri grabbed me around the waist again and dragged me back to him. "No practice today," he whispered, "They'll need our help cleaning up after the attack so we can stay here for while."

"Thats right," I chuckled, "No one else wakes up at such an ungodly hour as us," but despite my words, I didn't fall back to sleep. I wanted to enjoy every minute of my time with Dimitri.

We spent most what would have been our practice time lying in my bed, talking and occasionally kissing. Needless to say it was the best morning of my life. That is, until someone had the nerve to knock on my door. I knew it wasn't Liss because the bond would have told me if she were near and she was the only person, other than Dimitri, that I wouldn't murder on the spot for dragging me out of bed in the morning. Especially when in was in the arms of my Russian god, one who I noticed had somehow gotten out of his shirt and pants in the night and slept in only his boxers.

With a sigh, I rolled over Dimitri whispering, "Don't go any where. I'll get rid of whoever it is." He nodded and released his hold on my waist so I could go answer the door.

Whoever it was started banging on the door again. "Alright, alright! I'm coming! Calm the hell... Christian?" He was the last person I expected to be at my room first thing in the morning and I immediately stepped in front of the entry way, blocking him from seeing into my room.

"What do you want, Sparky?"

He looked up at me unhappily and jammed his hands in his pockets. "To be anywhere but here?" He offered, "But I was sent by Lissa to get you."

I checked the bond really quick, to see why Lissa couldn't have gotten me herself, and I found that both she and Adrian were in the infirmary healing people injured during the attack. Guess they gave up on keeping spirit a secret.

"Both her and Adrian are..."

"Yeah, I know." I cut him off and pointed to my head. "How come Lissa didn't just call me through the bond?"

"I donno," Christian shrugged, "she said she tried a few times, but you never came so here I am."

"Well I was a little preoccupied," I said vaguely. "Let me change and I'll meet you down there." I began to close the door, but Christian stuck his foot out and stopped the door.

"What? Do you want to watch or something, Fireboy? I thought it was only Adrian that wanted to see me undressed. Liss wouldn't be too happy about this," I joked, knowing that Christian had very little desire to see anyone other than Lissa naked. He gave me a dry look.

"I just thought that you should know, Adrian told Lissa and I some stuff about you and..."

"Him?" I asked, cutting Christian off again and kicking the door all the way open to reveal Dimitri tugging his shirt over his head. I jerked my thumb over my shoulder towards Dimitri for good measure, in case Christian managed to miss the giant Russian standing in my bedroom. "Yeah, I heard," I said, pointing to my head again

Christian still looked too shocked to speak until Dimitri adressed him. "Lord Ozera," he nodded politely.

"You can call him Christian, Comrade." And then I added as an afterthought, "Or Sparky, or Fireboy, or Pyro."

"Thanks Rose, but Christian is fine." Christian glared at me and Dimitri simply nodded.

"They found out last night," I added to Dimitri and he visibly relaxed. "Alright, well now that that's out of the way... Shoo Pyro, I need to change."

"Okay," he threw his hands up in a sigh of defeat, "but I have a few questions before I go."

"Fine! But come in before you alert the whole building that I'm dating my mentor." I yanked him by the arm into my room and slammed the door behind us. Dimitri seated himself at my desk while Christian leaned against my door. I, however, flopped myself down on to my bed with a groan.

"I can imagine how bad Lissa is going to be about this so do you have to interrogate me too?"

Christian rolled his eyes at me. "Well think about it Rose. You know Lissa is going to be emotional about this so if you tell me now, I can explain it to her when she calms down."

"Huh... Good point. Okay, fire away, Fireboy."

He scowled at me for the use of Fireboy, but didn't let that stop him from questioning me. "So when did this start?"

"Well that," I told him with a sigh, "is a much more complicated question than you realize." Dimitri chuckled from the other side of the room. "I'm gonna save us both some time and start at the beginning so shut up and listen, Sparky cause it's a long story."

So I outlined our whole whirlwind romance starting with the immediate feelings we both had. I told him about the lust charm, our stolen kisses, why Dimitri turned down Tasha's offer, and even the cabin yesterday. Dimitri chimed in occasionally to give details I left out, but mainly I talked and Christian listened.

"And there you have it," I finished and took a deep breath, waiting for his reaction. He sat silently for a few moments before he let a low whistle.

"Well that certainly was not what I expected." he glanced at me sheepishly, "I kinda thought you were just sleeping with him, no offence Rose."

I sat bolt upright in my bed. "Offence definitely taken," I huffed and Dimitri chuckled. I turned and looked at him seriously, "Actually, he's right. I never loved you Dimitri. Sorry." Dimitri gave me a dry look that told me he knew I was just trying to get him back for laughing at me and he wasn't amused.

Christian looked at the two of us intently before focusing on me. "Rose, I hope you know what you're doing here. I don't want to see you get hurt," he said, completely ignoring the fact that Dimitri was in the room. I glanced over at Dimitri, but he didn't look the slightest bit upset. He was looking at me expectantly, waiting for an answer.

"Wow, uh, I'm really flattered Christian, but of course I know what I'm getting in to," I responded with a smile at Dimitri, " thanks for worrying about me though, Sparky. Now leave so I can change."

Christian turned to go, but before he did, he shot me a quick smirk and said, "if anyone was going to have an affair with a teacher, it would be Rose Hathaway." And just like that, the snarky Christian I knew and loved was back. I chucked a pillow at him as he ducked out the door.

As soon as the door closed behind Christian, I turned to Dimitri and wiggled my fingers at him, calling him to come sit on the bed with me. Gently, he wrapped his arms around me and kissed my temple. "Lissa is waiting for you and I need to go back to my room and change," he whispered.

"Fine," I pouted and he gave me a quick kiss before getting up to leave. "Don't be a stranger, Comrade," I called to him and he gave me one of those rare full smiles that always made me breathless before, checking if the hallway was empty and disappearing out the door.

After hastily throwing my hair up and pulling on some clothes I headed off to the clinic, dreading facing Lissa.

**AN: so whatya think?**

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**My longest chapter by farrrrrr**

**Cheers, LLM**


	7. A Less Than Perfect Talk With Lissa

**Hi everyone! I'm back :] Thank you sooo much to everyone that reviewed the last chapter. Every time I check my email and see that I received a review it completely makes my day! You guys are the absolute most fantastic readers ever!**

**Much thanks to Nicia for Beta reading this for me. Yayyy!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but the idea**

As I walked to the clinic, now that my mind wasn't preoccupied, I could feel small bursts of spirit coming through the bond every now and then. I seriously hoped that all this spirit wasn't going to affect either mine or Lissa's moods later.

The first person that I saw when I walked into the building was Adrian; slumped in a chair looking like crap. He probably hadn't had any of his vices today and I would have bet my life that Adrian couldn't remember the last time he woke up this early. I actually found myself feeling bad for him.

Walking up, I placed a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and gave me a small smile.

"Little Dhampir. So glad you decided to grace us with your presence."

Adrian would be Adrian, no matter what; but I could tell he hardly had enough energy to attempt his normal witty charm. I gave his shoulder a squeeze.

"Are you okay?"

"Perfect now that you're here." I gave him a hard look and he sighed. "I'm not feeling so hot today, excluding my looks of course."

Adrian may have a reputation, but it couldn't be more off. Sure he was still a boozing womanizer some of the time, but hardly anyone knew how amazing and selfless really was. He had no ties to St. Vlads, except for the fact that this is where Lissa and I live; but here he was sacrificing health and happiness to help complete strangers. He had come such a long way from the party boy we originally met.

"Adrian," I looked at him seriously, "you're such a good person." More than likely, no one ever gave Adrian any credit for being a contributing Moroi, so I thought someone should. "I'm really proud of you."

He stood up, almost putting us chest to chest. "I'm not following you Little Dhampir."

I looked up at him, trying to see his face with our height difference. "Well, look at you, running around here healing all these people like you're… I don't know… Jesus or something."

At this, Adrian threw his head back and laughed raucously. I punched him in the shoulder.

"I'm being serious!"

He smiled, showing me he understood. "Well, thanks. I can't say I've ever been compared to Jesus before."

"Don't let it go to your head. I'm going to go find Lissa."

Adrian suddenly looked nervous and grabbed a hold of my wrist. Turning back to face him, I attempted to raise one of my eyebrows like Dimitri, but sadly, both of them lifted_._

"Rose," I knew he was being serious when he actually called me by my given name. "I'm really sorry, but last night I was with Lissa and she…"

It warmed my heart seeing how worried he was that he'd betrayed me. He trailed off as a big smile appeared on my face.

"Why are you smiling?"

"It's just cute how scared you are, but I already know and I'm not mad. It's about time I told her anyways."

With one last smile, I turned and walked deeper into the infirmary. I found Lissa tending to Jean, one of the guardians that took part in the fake strigoi attack on me yesterday, and she was now clutching her arm to her chest. Lissa took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and placed her hands on Jean's arm.

Now that I was standing right next to Lissa, the feeling of spirit nearly knocked me off my feet. Jean's face relaxed and Lissa smiled wearily at her. After Jean had thanked her and walked out of the room, Lissa still hadn't noticed me. She sat herself down in a chair and leaned her head against the wall.

I knocked softly on the door frame. Looking up at me, Lissa smiled which immediately put me on my guard. I had expected her to go off on me the second she saw me, demanding answers. Checking the bond, however, I realized that she'd forgotten with everything going on and I relaxed a bit.

"Liss, you look exhausted."

"I feel exhausted," she joked.

I poked my head in the hallway to check how many people were still in the clinic. There were just a few people, students and teachers alike, were moseying around the lobby and none of them looked like they would drop dead if Lissa left for a while.

"You could use a break. Come and get breakfast with me and I bet a feeding would make you feel better," I told her.

Lissa looked worried and I could feel through the bond that Lissa thought her place was here in the clinic helping people.

"There's hardly anyone here. No one will die if you go and get some food," I pointed out.

She smiled and pulled herself out of the chair. "You're right, let's go."

"Aren't I always?"

The walk to the cafeteria was filled with mild chatter. I hadn't realized how much I missed just spending time with Lissa and suddenly I wished everything could go back to the way it was before, when we were on the run, but as soon as that thought crossed my mind, I shoved it right back out again because if Lissa and I were still living in Portland, I would have never met Dimitri; and if we had ever run into a strigoi I would have definitely been unprepared.

As we entered the cafeteria, Lissa and I split ways: Lissa for the feeders and me for the food, specifically donuts. As we met back up at the table, Lissa immediately began talking about graduation and all her plans for when we moved to court together. I was paying attention, until I saw the door open over Lissa's shoulder. Dimitri had just walked in, freshly showered and in clean clothes. As if he could sense me looking at him, he turned and met my gaze.

Remembering last night and this morning, I grinned broadly at him. The only sign that he had noticed me was a slight lift in the corner of his mouth, probably not enough that anyone else would notice, but since I had been spending almost every waking minute outside of classes training with him, I'd had a lot of practice reading his face.

Too late I realized that Lissa had stopped talking and was looking over her shoulder to see what I was smiling at. As soon as she saw that it was Dimitri, I felt a spark of remembrance through the bond, quickly followed by a wave of anger.

Lissa turned back to look at me with a stormy look on her face. I grimaced, and Dimitri who was still looking my way, raised an eyebrow questioningly. I simply shook my head at him and turned to face Lissa.

"You and him!" She hissed at me, pointed across the room at Dimitri's retreating figure.

"Yeah, me and him." I gave her a small chuckle which only seemed to make her angrier.

"This isn't funny, Rose!" She said, he voice getting louder, "I can't believe you didn't tell me!"

People started looking over from the table around us, drawn by the noise.

"I'll you everything if you just calm down!" I whispered anxiously, trying to avoid causing a scene. This was definitely an argument that needed to take place behind closed doors.

"That's not the point!" She yelled.

"Shhh, Lissa!"

"I shouldn't have had to find out through Adrian!"

I tried to reach across the table and take her hand in a calming gesture, but she jerked out of my reach and stood up.

"For a long time, there really wasn't anything to tell anyways," I told her, trying to placate her.

"Not much to tell?" Her voice rose an octave and was easily loud enough for the tables around us to hear. "You've been having a romantic relationship with your mentor, Rose!"

"I have not!" I shouted back, just because other people were listening.

"God, you're still lying to me! Why don't you trust me? I'm your best friend, Rose!"

Looking around, I saw that we had the attention of most of the tables close to us; but thankfully at that moment, Adrian walked up and put his arm around Lissa's shoulder.

"Cousin," he said softly to Lissa, "don't you think it's a little bit early to be shouting such crazy things _**in front of the whole school**_?" He squeezed her shoulder for emphasis on the last part.

If Adrian hadn't shown up then, I was about a heart beat from dragging Lissa out of the cafeteria by her hair and bitching her out. I understood that she was angry with me but shouting it out in front of the whole school was something I would have never thought she'd do. Suddenly, an idea struck me and I checked the bond thoroughly. Sure enough, hidden underneath her anger was darkness fueling her on to an irrational level. She'd been healing people all morning so I guess it was only to be expected and I cursed myself for not checking sooner. Maybe then she wouldn't have blown up at me in public.

Sighing, I pulled the darkness through the bond. Despite knowing what came with it I did it for Lissa anyway; because she was my best friend and my charge. If the roles were reversed, I knew she'd do the same for me.

I saw Lissa relax a bit, until reality hit her and she smacked her hands over her mouth. As the darkness hit me, I felt my mood plummet; but since I was expecting it, it didn't make me go crazy like last time with Jesse.

"Oh God! I'm so sorry, Rose!" Lissa looked devastated, but I could feel her brain kick into overdrive through the bond.

"Just kidding!" She suddenly shouted and Adrian and I looked at her like she'd lost it. "I was trying to make a joke," she said, still loud enough for other people to hear, "but I guess it wasn't funny. Sorry!" She grinned sheepishly at me adding to the performance.

I could tell that she was trying to get the other people listening in to write it all off as a joke gone wrong. For the most part, it seemed to be working. People were sighing in disappointment and turning back to their food. Lissa immediately tried to rush around the table to hug me, but I put my hands up to ward her off. I had known that Lissa would probably freak out on me when she finally found out and I didn't blame her for exploding like she did because it was, in part darkness fueled; but now it was in me and I just wanted to get away from her because the more I thought about it, the angrier I got and I didn't want to say something stupid, that I'd later regret, because of the darkness.

At that moment, Adrian caught my attention and tipped his head in the direction of the back corner of the cafeteria where staff room was where the guardians ate. Dimitri had just come out and was now striding across the cafeteria towards my table, no doubt sent by Alberta because I was involved. He already had his severe mentor look on and I knew that he thought that I was the one causing trouble… which for once I wasn't.

After what Lissa was just shouting, the last thing I needed was to be seen with Dimitri. That would only fuel the fire. So I caught his eye and shook my head, telling him not to come over, and before I said something I'd regret… I ran.

**AN: so what did you guys think? This was my second longest chapter ever! I've already started working on the next one. If anyone has any ideas for where this story should go or something they think should happen I'd love to hear it! also I love doing requests so if anyone has a one shot or short chapter fic they want to have written let me know!**

**Review please :]**


	8. The Morning After

**AN: Hello lovelies! Im back. So sorry for the long wait. College apps were pretty much drowning me. Also im just a funny updater. If im not inspired, I don't write because it basically turns out like crap, but I finished and its posted to enjoyyy :] **

**p.s. this chapter is some fluff for you and no worries the next chapter will have more plot :]**

**I don't own it, you know the drill. Much thanks to Nicia for betaing this. You are wonderful!**

I couldn't remember the last time I'd run from a fight voluntarily, but picking a fight with Lissa over that in public could have been disastrous. After bolting from the cafeteria, I ran towards the gym as fast as I could, knowing that it would be empty during breakfast. The darkness I had pulled from Lissa in the cafeteria was slowly making me angrier and angrier and I knew that if I didn't do something there would be nothing stopping me from running back to lunch and giving Lissa a piece of my mind.

To avoid that, I decided to use physical exertion as a distraction so I went after the punching bag like there was no tomorrow, not thinking about anything else except for the rhythm of my hands hitting the bag.

Eventually, when my muscles began to ache, I sank down against the wall, resting my head on it. I don't know how, but it seemed like the physical exertion had burned the darkness out of me. I felt completely normal again, if a little tired.

Though this was no make out session with Dimitri, it proved just as effective at getting rid of the darkness for the moment. It made me feel _so _much better knowing that I now had two proven methods to get rid of the effects of darkness. I felt… more in control, like I wasn't going to lose my mind at any second and it was wonderful. Before I could stop myself, I threw my arms up and let out a whoop of excitement.

"What are you doing?" A voice with a slight Russian accent floated over my shoulder. I turned towards the gym door to find Dimitri striding across the room towards me.

"Hey Comrade," I called to him as he made his way over then stood so close to me that there was barely a breath between us. Tilting my head back so I could look him the eye, I gave him a small smile.

"Rose, it's 2nd period. Have you been in here since lunch?"

"I… What? 2nd Period?" How had I missed the bell ringing? Even if there weren't any combat classes in here this morning, surely someone had walked in and seen me. "Why didn't they tell me I was missing class?"

"Yuri tried, Rose. He said you wouldn't respond so he asked me to come get you," Dimitri said as he reached a hand up to place it on my cheek. I guess he was serious when he said that he didn't want to deny our relationship anymore because he's never touched me without an excuse in public before.

"Wow. I didn't even notice," I admitted, "Liss has been using a lot of spirit and I just sort of lost it I guess." I reached up to cover his hand in my own and he began stroking his thumb across my cheek.

"How are you now?" he asked seriously, like always, as he searched my eyes.

"Fine, I think now. I don't feel like I'm about to go insane and hurt someone anymore," I said with a shiver. Feeling like you couldn't control your own body was a horrible feeling. I could still see the worry all over his face, no matter how good he thought he was at hiding it. Not from me. I couldn't say anything to comfort him though, because I was just as scared as he was that one day I'd lose myself completely to the darkness, just as Anna had. I didn't want to die. I already had once and I think that was enough for me.

"I'm just really tired. I can't believe I was in here during breakfast and first period too." As if on cue my stomach began to grumble.

"Come to think of it, I really am hungry."

Dimitri chuckled and dropped his hand from my face only to grab my hand instead. "I figured as much. Breakfast is over, but I'm sure we can still get you some food. Let's go," he said before tugging me towards the doors.

As soon as we exited the gym, I dropped his hand reluctantly, but gave it a quick squeeze before I did. The walk to the cafeteria was filled with a comfortable silence. It still amazed me that I could be with another person and not feel the need to talk. Dimitri was the only person with whom I didn't feel the need to fill the silence and be the center of attention. It was good practice though because once I became Lissa's guardian I would need to become as inconspicuous as possible, no matter how many people expected crazy, funny Rose all the time.

As we entered the cafeteria, we got a few strange looks because of me. The only other people in the room were guardians that missed breakfast because of shifts so it was a little weird that I was in there. Dimitri didn't act like he noticed and simply walked up to the empty lunch. I trailed behind as he whispered something to the Lunch Moroi and she handed me a tray of food, including, chocolate donuts. I figured Dimitri had something to do with the donuts, but his face didn't show anything.

I walked over to my normal table even though my friends were in class and to my surprise Dimitri sat down with me. I thought that he would give me food and a pass to class and then disappear off to do whatever it was he does when he isn't with me… probably read a western novel.

I gave him a questing look. "What? I can't sit with you?" he asked.

"Yeah, of course you can. I just wasn't expecting you to."

He just sat down and said, "I don't have any where that I have to be," which was his way of saying "I want to be here with you and I don't have any duties that will take me away." I don't know what it was about breakfast today, but Dimitri was more open and free than I had ever seen him. I was shocked to see that he was actually sticking to what he had said in my room last night because he was Dimitri Belikov and he never put himself above his duty.

As impossible as it seems, I felt like we were on at date in the St. Vlads cafeteria. Dimitri was telling me a story about a time when he was little and his sister, Sonya, was pretending to be a hair dresser for the day and made him walk around with pigtails in his hair. And typically polite Dimitri did it without complaint. By the end of the story, I was losing it, laughing so hard that I couldn't breathe. Even he was laughing, but I'm sure it was at my reaction and not the actual story. Trying to calm my self down, I looked away from him and down at my tray, gasping for breath. That's when I noticed that my tray was completely empty. I had finished eating and neither of us had noticed. Looking around the room, however, I did notice that we had attracted a lot of stares from the other guardians in the room.

I glanced sideways at him and he just shrugged. Well, if Dimitri didn't care, then neither did I. Sadly, he had noticed my empty tray as well and decided it was time to go.

"Are you sure you're feeling alright, Rose?" he asked, studying me hard, probably looking for signs that I was lying.

"Yeah, I'm feeling totally normal. Well, normal for Rose. Not crazy Rose anyway," I joked.

He stood up, "Okay, I'll take you to class."

"Wait," I cried, "I lied! I'm not okay. If you take me into class, I'll go psycho and kill someone and you would be held responsible because you let me go."

He looked at me sternly, but I could tell he was amused. "Rose, come on. You have to go."

"What's the point? No on is actually going to be teaching anyways. The school was attacked yesterday and even if Kirova thinks that we should all still be in class, no one else does."

"You still have to go." Grabbing my hand, he attempted to pull me to my feet, but I resisted, throwing my body weight away from him.

"No, no, no, no, no!" I whined, trying to wiggle from his grasp.

"Roza…" he sighed and my heart leapt up in my throat at the sound of my Russian name.

Instead of giving in like I thought he was going to, he simply wrapped an arm around my waist and hoisted me out of my chair like I weighed nothing, which I'm sure if you're a really ripped Russian I did.

"Hey, put me down you giant. This may be legal is Siberia, but not here in America," I screeched.

"Roza, you are down," he murmured in my ear. Technically my feet were on the ground, but he was practically dragging me across the room like a rag doll.

"Okay, fine. Let go of me." Looking around the room, I noticed that we had the attention of pretty much every guardian there and they were giving us looks ranging from humor to confusion to downright shock. I decided to make this easier for the both of us and stop struggling and let him walk me to class.

When we stopped outside the door of Guardian Theory, Dimitri turned to look at me. "Don't get kicked out, Rose."

"What? Have some faith, Comrade." Feeling risky, I peaked around and, spotting no one, reached up to press my lips to his cheek. It was such an innocent gesture, but it made me tingle from head to toe and I couldn't keep the huge grin off my face as I walked into class and took my seat next to Eddie.

**So thoughts? Do you think Dimitri was a little too OOC? I couldn't decide. Also I think I had some timeline issues for this chapter because I got confused while writing it so forgive me. Review and tell me what you think!**

**~LLM**


	9. Rose Meets Lake

**AN: Ello lovelies! Not much happens in this chapter but I assure you that it was necessary to the plot. I made it extra fluffy to make up for it though :] **

**This chapter is dedicated to for the lake idea! Thanks to Nicia for betaing, she is wonderful!**

**Usual disclaimers. Please remember to review, it keeps me motivated.**

"Miss Hathaway, You're late." As expected, Stan was on my case.

"I know, I have a pass," I told him as I held it in the air. Dimitri had opted to just give me a late pass rather than walk in and talk to Stan. We didn't want the other kids to start thinking that I got preferential treatment, even though I basically did.

Stan came by and plucked the pass out of my hand. He studied it closely, but returned to his desk when he was satisfied that I hadn't forged it and resumed teaching.

"Rose," Eddie whispered, "What happened to your hands?"

"Huh?" I glanced down at them in confusion. My knuckles were seriously scraped up. That must have been from the punching bag; but I had been too distracted, first by the darkness and then by Dimitri to notice the dull, throbbing pain.

"Oh, punching bag," I told him, flexing my hands.

"How the hell did a punching bag do that?"

I couldn't think of a way to lie my way out of this one, so I resigned to tell Eddie the truth. What could I have said? The punching bag was fighting back?

Pulling my chair closer to his, I began the story in hushed whispers. "Remember what happened yesterday with Jesse? And how I freaked out and tried to kill him?"

"Of course I do," he responded, "You really scared me, Rose."

"Sorry," I whispered, "But it's not my fault." He looked at me incredulously. "It's honestly not!" And I launched into the whole story starting with the extent of Lissa's powers and the darkness that comes with them. I told him how sometimes it leaks into me and I lose my mind.

"Oh man… I had no idea." He looked shocked.

"Yeah, no one does, except Dimitri. I just recently figured it out, but we haven't told Kirova yet so I'm expecting to be dragged down to her office any minute for what happened yesterday," I joked.

"With the attack, she probably has more important things to deal with than you beating up a royal Moroi. When is that different from any other day with you?" He said with a smirk, /He smirked slightly, "You smack Christian and Adrian around all the time."

I punched him lightly in the shoulder and turned back to Stan. Maybe I'd actually pay attention today.

When lunch time rolled around, I could feel Lissa's dread at seeing me through the bond. She was worried that I would be totally angry with her and bitch her out for this morning. Normally I would have, but after my bout with the darkness this morning and lunch with Dimitri, I couldn't bring myself to care.

I had gotten to the cafeteria before Lissa and was already seated at our table with my food when she walked up. She looked at me nervously and was about to open her mouth to apologize when I smiled at her. I felt her worry melt away through the bond and she walked around the table to hug me.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered, "I don't know what came over me."

"I do," I told her, and explained that I ran off because I took some darkness from her, not because I was angry.

"I can't believe you didn't tell me earlier." She looked at me sadly, but she was right. I had no excuse for not telling her. Sure, I didn't want her to feel guilty for keeping us apart or add stress to her life, but I never mentioned anything. In fact, I had actively hid it from her, my best friend.

"I know Liss, I'm so sorry. I was being stupid because I was scared. The few times that I talked myself into coming clean, something would come up or I would chicken out. And like I said, for a while there was nothing to tell other then the fact that I had a stupid crush on him. Also, sometimes things were just so messed up between me and him that I didn't want to talk about it."

She smiled sympathetically at me. "I know, Rose, and it's in the past. But I do want to know everything."

So much like I did with Christian the night before, I recounted everything to Lissa in hushed voiced before everyone else had shown up at our table. Lissa aw'ed and giggled in all the right places and when I finished, she looked at me with a dreamy look on her face.

"You really love him don't you?" she asked with a knowing glint in her eye.

"Yeah I do," I said and I knew I had a goofy smile on my face.

Just then Christian walked up, took one look at me and said, "Hey Rose, going to kill anyone this afternoon?" and just like that, it was like the whole morning had never happened.

When the bell rang to signal the end of lunch, Lissa and I got up to go to our afternoon classes. We passed by a couple of Moroi tables on our way to the doors and they seemed to be staring at Liss and I, well more specifically me. As soon as a few of them saw me looking, they ducked behind their hands and began whispering.

I turned towards Lissa to ask if she knew what it was about, but instead she took a hold of my hand and asked me if I would come and hang out in her dorm tonight. I told her I would, and with a smile we separated to go to our math classes.

My day passed with a couple more incidents of staring, but I wasn't worried. It was probably just Jesse's damn blood whore rumors starting up again to get me back for beating him up last night. They'd pass and I was about to graduate anyways, so who cared what these people thought.

Over the next few days, I heard a couple people hiss the word _whore_ at me. Yup, it was definitely Jesse again. He did seem to have given up on the _blood_ whore attempts though and I was thankful because everyone had already thought I was a whore for a long time now so this was nothing new.

One afternoon when I was walking to training with Dimitri some non royal Moroi started flat out snickering at me. I was still puzzling over it when I walked into the gym and dropped my bags inside the door. Immediately, Dimitri noticed something was wrong.

"Rose, what happened?" He was studying my face with a concerned look on his.

"It's nothing, Comrade," I told him, trying to assuage his worries.

He didn't buy it. "Tell me."

"It's just I feel like people have been giving me weird looks recently."

Dimitri fell silent, clearly out of his element dealing with high school drama. Even when he was in high school, I'm sure that he never socialized enough to be in any drama. Right at that moment, however, the doors opened, saving Dimitri from answering.

It was Alberta; who was sticking to her promise to supervise our practices from now on. She looked at the two of us staring at her and said, "Just carry on like usual. Pretend like I'm not even here."

I couldn't stop my self from snorting out loud. If she weren't here, I would probably have Dimitri pressed up against a wall by the end of practice.

Dimitri just gave me a pointed look and pointed outside. "Laps, Rose."

With a sigh, I ambled my way out onto the track. The sooner I was done with my laps, the sooner I could start sparring with Dimitri.

The rest of practice went by like normal. Dimitri and I sparred, not allowing ourselves to lose focus on the other. For one thing, this was training and also, Alberta was watching us like a hawk. She even joined in a few times and let me spar against her. It was good practice to spar against someone whose moves I hadn't memorized.

Practice had just ended and I was packing up my things when Alberta decided to give me a pop quiz.

"So, Rose, suppose you and Vasilisa are out shopping or eating at a restaurant," she began. This was starting to sound very familiar. "And you are attacked by a group of Strigoi. You're outnumbered and you have lost your stake. What do you do?"

I glanced at Dimitri and he met my eyes. We were both remembering the time when he had asked me nearly the exact same question. Back then I had wanted to throw something at him, but now I better understood what a serious question it actually was.

"First of all," I started off, holding up a finger for emphasis, "I would never lose my stake. That thing will be stuck to me like glue." Alberta chuckled.

"And second, I know exactly what to do. Run. Which I'm very good at, in case you've forgotten." I told her, referring back to the time that Lissa and I had run away from the academy together.

Alberta nodded. "True, but you wouldn't do that again," she sounded confident, obviously sure that I would never run away from anything again.

Oh I wouldn't? I glanced at Dimitri quickly and he seemed to know what was coming because as soon as I started to run for the doors, so did he.

"Oh yes I would!" I shouted at Alberta as I ducked under Dimitri's arms. Sometimes it really came in handy to be a foot shorter than your mentor.

I took off running as fast as I could towards the lower campus. Maybe I could make it there before Dimitri caught me. Sadly as soon as I reached the boundary between the campuses, I heard thundering footsteps behind me.

Damn, if only I had made it around the lake that separated the two campuses I could have ducked into one of the elementary buildings and taken a back way back to my dorm. As it was, I was standing on the edge of said lake listening to the sound of Dimitri's rapidly approaching footsteps.

If Alberta wanted to test me, I'd treat it like a test. At the very last second I whirled around to face Dimitri and crouched down into my fighting stance. Attempting to catch me off guard, Dimitri kept charging right towards me and immediately went on the offensive. I was ready though and blocked the majority of them and even got in a few kicks and punches of my own. In the back of my mind, I registered the fact that Alberta had caught up with us and standing to the side, observing, but she wasn't alone. We had attracted quite a crowd.

After a few minutes of even matched sparring, I took a chance and threw all my body weight at Dimitri. He didn't fall like I had hoped, but he did stumble backwards a few feet. I was proud for a moment before I realized what he was about to do. He was taking advantage of the separation to put more force behind his charge in an attempt to take me to the ground.

He had forgotten, however, that we were standing on the edge of a lake because the force with which he hit me sent me flying backwards. If I was going into the lake, I wasn't going alone though. I grabbed onto any part of his body I could reach and dragged him with me.

I shrieked as my back hit the icy water; and soon all I could feel was cold water all around me and Dimitri's body on top of mine. Pushing against his chest, I clawed my way to the surface, gasping and spluttering. My hair clung to my head, plastered all over my face and in my eyes; and from what I could make out, Dimitri's was just as bad as mine. By the way he was coughing; I could tell that he had definitely forgotten that we were sparring on the edge of a lake.

"You idiot!" I punched him in the shoulder, but I could tell that he knew I was kidding.

"I would say I'm sorry, but the look on your face right now is too priceless," he said with a grin.

I could hear the laughter of everyone who had stopped to watch our epic fight and I couldn't help but feel slightly embarrassed. I mean, I was Rose Hathaway and I was just chucked in the lake by my mentor, whom I had beaten in trials just a few days ago. I scowled at Dimitri, which only made him grin more. When had he become so cheeky?

Standing up, I let out a huff as I looked down at myself. My clothes were all covered in lake scum. Dimitri hauled himself to his feet as well and reached forward to brush a stand of wet hair out of my face.

"Alright you two, out of the lake," Alberta called from the shore. I turned my back on Dimitri and stalked off, not quite ready to let him off the hook even if I wasn't that mad. He had thrown me in a lake after all. In public.

When I got to the shore, I immediately started to wring my hair out. Alberta was too busy shooing the onlookers back to classes to notice the kiss that Dimitri snuck against the back of my neck. I hoped no one else was looking either. He had obviously picked up on the fact that I was angry and was trying to redeem himself. I simply grabbed some lake scum that was stuck on my shoulders and threw at him. I would have liked it if it hit him in the face, but instead it hit him in the chest where he was already wet and scummy.

"I need a shower. Now," I told him. By now Alberta had managed to clear off all the onlookers so it was just the three of us.

"Yes, you do," she laughed, "both of you." She paused for a second and then said, "Not together!"

With a laugh, I turned and winked at her. Dimitri on the other hand threw on his guardian mask. Thankfully Alberta had managed to get all the other students back to their respective campuses because if anyone had heard this conversation, I would certainly be in hot water. Alberta gave me a stern look and I threw my hands up in defeat. Dimitri gave my hand a quick squeeze before I stalked off towards my dorm.

I was getting a little chilly walking around on a cool spring day while soaking wet, so I started to jog towards my dorm until someone called my name.

"Yeah?" I turned towards the voice to see Jesse and Ralf step out from around the corner of the building. Shit, this couldn't be good. "What do you want, Zeklos?"

He eyed me up and down before speaking. "The more important thing is what you want, Rose

**AN: the less feedback and reviews i get, I tend to be more unmotivated to right so please review and tell me what you think. Im still open to ideas and you will get a chapter dedicated to you if I use your idea :]**

**Cheers! LLM**


	10. Let The Rumors Fly

**AN: Hey everyone! Heres the next chapter. So you may have noticed that I changed the rating to M and that's because the next chapter contains a lemon. Its not raunchy, but you can skip if you'd like and you won't miss anything. Also, anyone want to write a lemon for me to use later in this story? I'm not very good at them and I used up all my ideas. PM me if you'd like to do it and I'd be so grateful.**

**Same disclaimers and Thanks a bunch to Nicia, my beta!**

**This chapter is dedicated to Ash-Bookworm113 for the Jesse idea :]**

"What do I want?" I repeated, attempting to raise an eyebrow at him.

"That's what he said, didn't he?" Ralf pointed out unnecessarily.

"Yeah, I heard him. Thanks. Don't snap at me because you're both idiots that don't make any sense." I gave them both my best glare.

"You'll see what I mean in a minute Rose, if you'd just shut up and listen," Jesse said smugly.

Crossing my arms over my chest, I stared at him impatiently.

Jesse sauntered towards me, with Ralf following close behind, as he began to speak. "Here's the thing Hathaway. We know a potentially embarrassing and dangerous secret about you… and your mentor."

_Shit_, I thought and I swallowed nervously. "What the hell are you talking about?" I spat.

"We know about you and Belikov," Jesse whispered, putting his mouth right next to my ear. I suppressed a shudder and resisted the urge to shove him away from me.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I told him.

"Don't play stupid with us, Rose. We know, you can't deny it." Ralf said with a smirk.

"Know what?" I almost shouted with frustration. I had a good idea of what they "knew" but I wanted them to say it and not beat around the bush. Jesse looked at me for a couple seconds before deciding to respond.

"We know you guys are sleeping together."

He knew. They knew. We were found out. I was getting expelled. Dimitri was getting fired. My breath caught in my throat and it took a lot of self control not to punch them both so hard in the face that they forgot why they came here. In am impressive show of acting and self-control, I managed to snort incredulously.

"You dumbass! We're not sleeping together. He's my mentor. That would be completely illegal." Technically that wasn't a lie because Dimitri and I hadn't slept together. I planned on doing it very soon, but technically we hadn't yet and Jesse had only accused us of having sex.

"Its completely obvious," Jesse countered and I raised my eyebrows at him. "Everyone knows that you two are weirdly close and then Lissa was shouting about the two of you being together at breakfast the other day. So Ralf and I started watching you and it all fell into place."

"So you're the source of the _whore_ rumors." I stepped towards him threateningly.

"You don't deny it?" Ralf asked with a smirk.

"What?" I exclaimed, "Of course it's not true."

"You're lying," Jesse said at he narrowed his eyes at me.

"I am not. You're just angry because Dimitri busted in and broke us up a while back. Did you think that you were going to get some?" I asked, trying to deflect his attention.

Jesse actually looked embarrassed. "And Belikov was just jealous. That's why he threw me out so fast. Didn't want anyone else playing with his toy."

I didn't care that he was a royal moroi. I was going to kill him. I brought my arm back to punch him in the nose; but before I could swing forward a large, warm hand wrapped around my wrist, accompanied by the sharp scent of aftershave mixed with lake water.

"Rose," Dimitri spoke sternly, "What are you doing?"

"Nothing." I said through gritted teeth, " Though Jesse was just about to get reacquainted with my fist."

Jesse looked slightly uneasy, but managed to smile at Dimitri all the same. "Hello Guardian Belikov. We were just discussing Rose's love life."

Dimitri stiffened at my side and I felt his grip tighten on my wrist. He gave Jesse a cold look. "Mr. Zeklos, I don't know what's really going on here, but you should return to your dorm before something happens."

"Sure thing, Guardian Belikov," Jesse said with a smile. Before he turned to leave, however, he mouthed the word 'whore' at me once more.

"You're delusional!" I shouted after him, but Dimitri tugged me around a corner.

When I turned to face him, he had his arms folded across his chest and his stern mentor face on. "Rose, what was going on back there?"

I looked at him levelly and tossed my hair over my shoulder. "They know about us." His guardian mask slipped off as his mouth fell open in shock.

"I… What?"

"Exactly! And you stopped me from punching his lights out."

"That wouldn't have solved anything, Rose."

I sighed, "Yeah, but it would have made me feel better."

The corner of Dimitri's mouth lifted, but that was the only indication he gave that he was amused. "Punching him would have also confirmed his suspicions." Dimitri pointed out.

"Huh, I didn't think of that," I mused, "guess it was a good thing you were there to stop me." Even though I was joking, my mood was plummeting. Graduation never seemed so far away and all I wanted to do was be with Dimitri. Would things ever be easy for us? Probably not, I realized. Even after I graduated - when we became public, Dimitri was going to get a lot of shit for this. People would probably realize that this had been happening while I was a student and we would still be shamed for it. Our love would always be tainted by what others thought of us.

Dimitri, noticing my change in mood, put his finger under my chin and tipped my face up to his. It was a good thing we were blocked from view by the shadows between two buildings.

"What's wrong, Rose?" He asked, softly. Part of wanted to break down into his arms and tell him how much everything sucked; and another part of me thought that maybe he hadn't thought that far in advance, and that if I pointed out how much crap he was going to get for this even after I graduated, he might decide I wasn't worth it. I knew that he loved me, but I was still insecure when it came to him. He was an amazing guardian and person, and with his looks he could probably have anyone that he wanted, but he chose me. Me, a silly seventeen year old girl with a temper and a best friend that was probably going to make me lose my mind. I couldn't even give him kids which was something I knew he wanted more then anything. Sometimes, I wondered what he still saw in me.

I glanced away from him. "Nothing. I was just thinking about how much worse the rumors are going to get after I almost punched Jesse. Oh, did I tell you that I was him spreading them? He's telling everyone that I'm a whore because I'm sleeping with you."

"You're not. But you're lying, Rose. I can tell." I still didn't answer. "Roza, tell me," he murmured.

"Don't you pull that Roza stuff with me. I can't say no when you do that," I huffed.

The mischievous glint in his eye told me he knew exactly what he was doing. "Please, Roza."

I glared at him. "You play dirty, you know that right?" He chuckled and told me he got it from me. "But, fine. I'll tell you, you manipulative Russian," I conceded.

After taking a deep breath I told him about my worries and how much I wanted it to be graduation right now. I even confessed how insecure I was, which shocked him the most. When I finished I stared at the ground for a moment before looking up at him through my lashes. His face was frozen in a mask of shock, like I had just dumped ice water on his head or punched him in the face. "Can you say something please?" I asked him. He didn't speak, but he did however, pull me into his arms.

I wrapped my arms around him and breathed in his scent. I would never get tired of his aftershave. Suddenly I felt embarrassed of my outburst. Being in love had made me a lot more emotional. I moved to pull away from him, but he held me tight against him.

"Roza, nothing will ever make me walk away from you. I know it's going to be hard and people aren't going to be happy with this, but I'm in this for the long run. I'd only leave if you'd ask me to. And I don't want children unless they're yours. When imagine them they always have your eyes or your smile or your beautiful hair."

With a smile, I glanced up at him and met his gaze. He looked like he wasn't finished, but I reached up to kiss him anyways. He proved it a moment later when he pulled away and continued talking.

"It's funny because I always felt the same way. I'm always feeling insecure about you. You're young and so beautiful Roza, and you're going to go so far. And being tied to someone like me, with the scandal that comes with it, is just going to hold you back." As he said the words, I realized that he was just as worried as I was. Neither of us was infallible and neither of us liked admitting our weaknesses. But I had a feeling that after this conversation we'd be a lot stronger now that we had admitted this to each other.

"Being tied to someone like you is the best thing that happened to me," I told him, "I'm never going to walk away either so you're stuck with me for the rest of you're life."

He chuckled. "Exactly what I want," he whispered against my lips. Then he kissed me and the world disappeared. I wrapped my arms around his neck and hoisted myself up so that I could wrap my legs around his waist. The next thing I knew my back was pushed against the side of the building and I used it as leverage to push myself closer to Dimitri. Something about our previous conversation seemed to have confirmed our feelings for each other and our kissing was much more passionate then ever before.

I broke away from him, breathing heavily. "We should go somewhere private," I whispered breathily. I expected him to set me down and tell me how I was being naïve and that we needed to be careful until graduation, but instead he rested his forehead against mine and nodded.

He kissed me once more then set me down. I resisted the urge to look away; he was looking at me with such intensity.

"Come on," he said, gruffly. My heart had managed to lodge itself in my throat and it was beating wildly out of control as I followed him out of the space between the buildings. A group of lower classmen standing nearby gave us a funny look as we emerged. Great, more people to add fuel to the rumor fire. I rushed to catch up to Dimitri, but he didn't look at me. I was half scared that he would tell me that we shouldn't do this and send me away, but the look of passion still on his face told me otherwise.

Right before we were about to enter the guardian dorms he turned towards me and placed his keys in my hand.

"Use the square one to let yourself in the back door and meet me in my room," he said with a small smile.

"What?" I asked, questioning why he was smiling.

"Look at us," he said, "Sneaking around like this."

"Yeah it is kind of ridiculous isn't it?" I said and he nodded. "Well I guess not for me because I've spent half my life here at St. Vlad's sneaking around."

**AN: please review :] it keeps me motivated! Thanks so much for reading!**


	11. The First Time

**AN: Hello! This is a relatively quick update for me :] Thanks so much for all the reviews everyone. They were amazing, hence why this update was so quick so keep them coming please :]**

**Happy new years to everyone! I hope it was good :] It was my birthday on Friday so consider this a little reverse birthday gift from me to you all!**

**Thanks to Nicia, amazing beta as always! Give her some love. Usual disclaimers.**

**This chapter has some M content, just so you're warned, you wont miss anything if you skip it though. Enjoy!**

I made it through the back door and up to Dimitri's room without meeting anyone' which was just as well because the fewer witness's to me sneaking into my mentor's bedroom, the better. He had left his door unlocked for me, but when I opened it he had his back to me. I shut it quietly and I knew that he was aware of my entrance, but he still hadn't turned around.

"Dimitri," I whispered into the silence. He turned towards me and I could see the conflict in his eyes. I know he hated breaking rules and potentially getting the both of us in trouble, but I wasn't letting him back down this time. I walked over to him and grasped his hands in mine.

"Dimitri Belikov, I love you," I told him as I smoothed the worry lines out of his forehead. "Don't you love me?"

"You know I do Rose." he replied.

"So show me…" I knotted my fingers in his hair and pulled his head down to my level before kissing him. Whatever reservations he had flew out the window because he kissed me back with fervor.

"I love you Roza, so so much," he breathed, his accent thicker then ever, and I felt as if my heart might explode at the feeling. He wrapped his hands around my waist and hoisted me up so I could wrap my legs around him; much like he had done outside, but instead of using the wall as leverage he put his hands beneath my bottom. From this position my face was higher than his so he had to tip his head back to kiss me, and though I was severely conscious of my wet lake water hair falling in his face, but he didn't seem to care.

Things were quickly getting more and more heated and soon he walked us back to the bed and laid me down upon it.

This is it, I thought. Finally I'm going have sex with Dimitri. He must have been thinking something similar to me because he started to struggle with my wet tee shirt, trying to pull it over my head. With a little help from me we managed it and I began to work on his.

Soon enough, we were both lying there in only our underwear and I felt severely unsexy. I was wearing a soaking wet red sports bra and some mismatch blue underwear, with my hair falling stringy and wet around my face. I was sure I smelled like crap from that nasty lake water too, but Dimitri was looking at me like I was like the sexiest thing he'd ever seen.

He sat up, eyes raking over me so that he could slide my underwear down my legs and toss them on the floor, quickly followed by my wet sports bra.

With a deep breath, I reached to pull his boxers off. This was the first time I would be seeing him naked while he had seen me naked the night of the lust charm. It didn't seem fair.

Now that we were both completely naked, we couldn't keep out hands off each other or our lips away from each other's skin. After a few more minutes of kissing and caressing, Dimitri pressed himself against me and I knew that we were ready to take the next step. He pulled back to look me in the eye, yet I knew what he was asking without him saying the words. I nodded in response, letting him know that I was ready.

"It will probably hurt," he warned me.

"I know," I told him, remembering what Lissa had told me about her first time, "I don't care."

And he kissed me again as we became one.

It had hurt, but not nearly as much as I had expected and the pain had been easy to ignore. When it was over though, my hips ached from my legs being around Dimitri's waist and supporting his weight for the last half an hour, but it had been amazing. At times it seemed as if he had forgotten how to speak English and the sound of my Russian name sent chills down my spine.

"Oh my god," I whispered as I flopped back onto the bed and pushed some hair off of my now sweaty forehead. Dimitri rolled off me and pulled me to his chest.

He whispered something in Russian and I looked at him questioningly.

"I said, 'oh my god is right," he explained.

I pushed myself up on my elbows to look at him. "Why weren't we doing this before? I hold you responsible because I'd never had sex before so I had no idea what it would be like, but you knew. Why were you holding out on me?" I accused.

"Trust me when I say I had no idea it would be like this," he said with a chuckle.

Despite my words, I knew that it would have been wrong at any other time.

"I never thought I'd be covered in lake scum my first time," I mused, "bet no one else can say they've done that."

Dimitri laughed and said, "Well you always have been unique. I never expected to make love to someone covered in lake scum either."

"Which reminds me," I said, "We should most likely shower now because not only are we covered in lake scum, we're now also very sweaty."

Dimitri clutched me to him tighter. "Later," he whispered, "I don't want to let you go yet." So I snuggled down into his chest and he pulled the blankets over our naked forms.

After a moment of blissful silence, Dimitri spoke. "You know, I had wanted to wait until your birthday so it wouldn't have been quite so illegal," he said as he turned his head to bury it in my neck.

"We could have," I whispered back, not wanting to disturb the amazing calm that had settled over the both of us. "I would have understood. I probably would have bitched at you about turning me down again, but I would have been okay."

He turned to look at me with his eyes burning, "I wouldn't have been able to turn you down this time if I tried."

"Why's that?" I asked with a smile, "because I'm so sexy in lake water?"

He chuckled, but shook his head. "No, actually it was because of our talk outside. When I realized that you loved me as much as I loved you, I knew that there would never be anyone else for us. And in the long run, what does it really matter if its now or two weeks from now?"

"It doesn't matter one bit," I told him.

He looked thoughtful for a moment, "well, except for the fact that my romantic plans for your birthday have now been ruined."

Sitting up, I leaned over him with an open mouth. "Were you going to try and seduce me, Dimitri Belikov?" He just gave me a small smile. "I would have been a very willing participant," I continued, "and I think we can still put those romantic plans of yours to good use."

Eventually when we did get up and shower I could have gone back to my dorm, but I didn't want to leave. So I decided to skip dinner, ignoring Lissa's calls through the bond and fell asleep, naked in Dimitri's arms.

We woke the next morning to Dimitri's alarm blaring through the room. He groaned and rolled to smack it off. Even though we were still both naked I didn't feel self conscious. I started to stretch, but immediately stopped when I realized how sore I was.

"Ow!" I moaned.

"What's wrong?" Dimitri asked.

"I'm sore in places I didn't know could be sore!"

Dimitri laughed and apologized. "I'm sore too," he pointed out.

"What? Why are you sore?"

"Pleasing you is hard work," he said with a dry chuckle as he tapped me on the nose, "and I'm out of practice."

"Oh really? How out of practice?" I asked.

"Well, for the last 6 months I've been in love with you, and for the 6 months before that I was working at this place trying to find you."

"So it's all my fault?

"Yes."

"Good!" I said as I leaned in to kiss him again.

"Mmm, Roza," he murmured, "As much as I'd love to stay here with you if we don't go to practice Alberta will come looking for us."

"Alright," I sighed as I climbed out of bed, "Kick me out why don't you."

"You know it's not like that, Rose" He said as I hunted for my clothes.

"I know," I said, "I'm just messing with you." To my dismay, all my clothes were still soaking wet. If I had hung them up over night they probably would have dried by now, but I had been a little distracted.

"These are nasty," I told Dimitri, "I am not putting these back on."

He smiled at me and dug around in his drawers before pulling out a tee shirt and a pair of shorts for me. "Don't let anyone know where you got them," he said as he handed them, to me with a kiss. After I had dressed, Dimitri checked the hallway to make sure it was clear for me to leave and with one last kiss, I took off sprinting towards my dorm, clothes in hand, hearing as Dimitri called after me, "Don't be late to practice Roza!

**AN: So what did you think? Rose finally lost her virginity and it was my first lemon so, firsts for the both of us. Did it go well?**

**Review and let me know!**

**Cheers,**

**LLM x3**


	12. Doing Laundry

**AN: So im finally back. You all probably though I abandoned this story, but I would never. This semester has just been hell with scholarship applications, work, school, track practice and soccer practice ive been very overwhelmed. But ive been writing this in bits in my spare time and its finally complete. I hope the long wait hasn't made anyone lose interest. Soooo sorry it took so long!**

**Not beta'd because I wanted to post as soon as I finished it so forgive my mistakes.**

**I don't own anything as usual. **

**Enjoy and please review!**

As I rushed down the stair well, a whiff of Dimitri's after shave hit me and I looked around, confused. Had I forgotten something in his room?

When I saw that no one was following me, especially not a 6 foot 7 Russian, I realized with a start that it was his shirt I was wearing. Bringing it up to my nose, I took a huge sniff. He was never getting this back.

Now that I had reached the door leading to the lobby of the Dhampir dorms, I was faced with a choice. I could either go through the lobby to get to my dorm and risk the matron asking why I was returning from the staff wing in men's clothes or I could go out the window and walk in the front door and risk her reporting me for staying out in another dorm all night.

In the past, the matron had either been extremely oblivious or just couldn't be bothered with asking where students had been so I decided to simply sneak from the staff wing to the students dorms. Easing the door open, I slipped through and let it fall shut slowly. I had made it about halfway across the lobby before she caught me.

"Excuse me," the matron called out, "where are you going?"

After hiding a grimace, I turned to face her while affecting my most innocent face.

"I'm going to the laundry room," I said, holding up my wet clothes.

"It's in the hallway outside your dorm room." She looked at me suspiciously. "Aren't you a senior? You should know where the laundry room is by now."

"Yeah, I'm sure you can tell how often I do my own laundry," I joked, "And I wasn't here for two years. I just got back a couple months ago."

"Right," she nodded, "You're the Hathaway girl."

I couldn't decide if I should be offended or not. "Yup, that's me. The one and only."

"Well, it's down the hallway, marked laundry," she said.

"Thanks." I flashed her a smile before dashing up to my room.

By the time I got back to my room, I barely had time to change before I had to leave for practice so I wouldn't be late. After taking a second to throw Dimitri's clothes out of sight, I dashed out the door, brutally raking my still wet hair into a pony tail.

By the time I raced across the still deserted campus to the gym I expected to be at least a little late and I could imagine what Dimitri would say.

"Rose," he would sigh, "I thought I told you not to be late." But then he would smile at the memory of last night until he would remember that Alberta was in the room and his guardian mask would slip back into place.

As it was, however, I made it to the gym about 5 minutes early. When I pushed open the door, I found Dimitri and Alberta deep in conversation. They froze as I walked in and looked at me like I was the prodigal son returned.

"Rose… You're early?" Dimitri asked.

"Well I had some extra time to get ready this morning," I said, resisting the urge to wink.

"And you actually listened to me when I told you not be late," he said.

If Alberta hadn't been in the room I would have said something like "if you want me to listen to you, you should have sex with me more often."

Instead I just flashed him a smile and asked what they had been talking about when I walked in.

"We're starting up field experience again," Alberta told me and my good mood immediately dropped.

"You mean I have to go back to guarding Christian?"

"That's exactly what we mean," Dimitri said with a chuckle, "Kirova thinks that now that things have gotten back to normal after the attack, we should get the senior novices back into field experience."

"Well, that's awesome that there are no more classes, but… lots of Christian."

Dimitri rolled his eyes at me and If I was honest with myself, I really did like Christian, especially after how he fought with me in the battle and even though I hated to admit it, he was good for Lissa, but guarding him all the time meant fewer chances for me to sneak off and be with Dimitri.

"Wait!" Alberta and Dimitri turned to look at me, "Am I still going to be on half-time and see that stupid counselor?"

Alberta pursed her lips together in concentration while I waited on tenterhooks.

"No," she said finally, "you won't be on half-time, but I think you should still see Deirdre."

I opened my mouth to protest, but she held up a hand to silence me.

"Rose you were just in a traumatic battle on top of everything else that has happened since you returned and maybe if could help you with your… shadow kissed… side effects."

Turning towards Dimitri, I gave him a pleading look. "Rose, you're going to do it," he said with finality.

"Comrade!" I said, on the verge of whining.

"At least once, until Deirdre clears you," he said and I glared at him, but I could tell that he wasn't going to change his mind.

"Fine," I crossed my arms across my chest. "But I don't see anyone forcing Christian into therapy." Alberta simply gave me an exasperated look.

"I have to go to the assembly announcing field experience," she told us, "but since you two already know, you can stay here and practice if you'd like." She glanced between Dimitri and I. "Behave you two."

I snorted with laughter while Dimitri's mouth dropped open in shock. I don't think he was used to being treated as if he was a trouble maker like I was.

"Freedom!" I shouted once Alberta shut the gym door behind her. "What's on the schedule for today, Comrade?"

"Let's start off stretching," he said, motioning me over to the mats.

We seated ourselves across from each other and I put my legs out in from of my and wiggled my hands at Dimitri. Knowing what I wanted, he grasped my hands tightly in his and pulled towards his chest.

"Ow!" I moaned and he loosened his grip. "No, keep pulling," I told him, "My hips are just sore." Our gaze met and I know we were both reliving last night.

After a few more moments, I folded my legs under me and reached for Dimitri's hands to stretch him. We sat in silence until a question that had been nagging me after we slept together popped into my head.

"Dimitri." Our gaze met and he knew that I was about to say something serious. Releasing Dimitri's hands, I moved into the butterfly stretch before speaking.

"What are we going to do after graduation?"

He mimicked my stretch, but didn't say anything, knowing that I wasn't done speaking.

"I mean, no matter how we felt before, last night definitely changes things. There's no more pretending that we aren't together and that we don't feel this way. But we're both still guarding Lissa after graduation and we can't guard her properly if we feel this way. I don't see how I can be around you and not feel this way."

My chest tightened at the thought of spending every day standing silently next to him yet never actually being with him.

He studied me intently for a moment before reaching over to place his hand on my knee. Just that small touch caused a smile to break out across my face.

"I couldn't," he said earnestly, "I couldn't be around you and not be with you."

"I know," I placed my hand over his. "So what are we going to do?"

Pulling his hand out from under mine, Dimitri leaned back and rested on his elbows as he studied me. I could see every rise and fall of his chest and there was a strand of hair that had fallen in his eyes that I ached to brush back.

"I'll ask to be reassigned," he murmured with conviction.

"What?" I choked out as the gym door slammed open. Looking over Dimitri's shoulder, I saw Stan entering the room. Dimitri peered around to see who had come into the gym as well.

"Guardian Alto," he greeted Stan. "Is there something I can help you with?"

His words were perfectly polite, but I could hear the annoyance in his voice at Stan for walking in while we were talking about important things, namely our futures. Stan took no notice and simply walked over to us. I silently thanked Dimitri for leaning away from me.

"Guardian Petrov sent me to oversee your practice."

I frowned in displeasure. "Did she say why?"

"No," Stan answered me, "she just told me to come, but I assume it's to keep you two from hurting each other."

I almost laughed at the irony, but managed to keep a straight face.

"That won't be a problem today, Guardian Alto," Dimitri told him.

"How come?"

Dimitri looked at me, clearly not expecting to need a cover story.

"We fell in a lake yesterday," I supplied quickly, hoping that Dimitri would catch on.

"After hitting the water with such force, Rose is pretty sore," he lied. I was in fact very sore and we were taking it easy today for me, but it wasn't because we fell in the lake.

"Dimitri's more sore!" I piped up. Dimitri put a hand over my mouth and continued speaking. "So today we're taking it easy," he told Stan.

Stan glanced at my frowning face with Dimitri's hand still over my mouth and almost smiled.

"Right," he said, "Well carry on. I'll be over here." He turned to walk to the other side of the room and I licked Dimitri's hand.

He jerked it away with speed only a highly trained guardian can possess and looked at his hand with a frown before looking back at me.

"I can't believe you just did that." He shook his head at me and wiped his hand across my theigh, but I could tell that he was amused. I readjusted myself and reached down to touch my toes and Dimitri mimicked my movements.

"Dimitri," I murmured in a low voice, "You shouldn't give up being Lissa's guardian. Just hear me out for a second please? Being the last Dragomir's guardian is a huge honor and if any deserves it, it's you… not me or anyone else. And what if something happens between us? It would all be for nothing. People fight and fall out of love all the time. I want to believe we're different, but what if we aren't?" My whispers had become quick and frantic by the end at the thought of Dimitri and I possibly having to separate after graduation.

Dimitri glanced over his shoulder at Stan, where he was talking on his phone in the corner, and slid sideways, blocking me from Stan's view. He reached forward and placed a calloused hand on my cheek.

"You're wrong," he whispered, his voice thick with emotion, "you can guard the princess better than anyone else and you deserve to be her guardian. But most importantly, we are different. We've fought against so much to be together and now that we have it, I'm not giving it up."

I grinned at him and he removed his hand from my face. Leaning forward, I whispered, "I'll let you in on another secret." He looked at me expectantly, "I'm not giving it up either."

He laughed loudly and Stan shot us a look. Sobering up, I sighed. "So what are we going to do, Comrade?"

"You will guard the Princess and I will ask to be assigned to Lord Ozera," he stated.

"For the love of God, Dimitri, their names are Lissa and Christian. If she has to, Lissa will compel you to call her Lissa, not Princess." He wasn't amused. With a sigh, I shook my head at him.

"Won't that give us the same problem?" I asked, "If Lissa and Christian are always together then won't we still be distracted?"

"Not necessarily," he mused, "Both Lissa and Christian are going to have other guardians as well and this way we can get time off together, not trade shifts all the time."

"Wow, it sounds like you've put a lot of thought into this… and it also sounds like it will work as long as Lissa and Christian don't break up."

"Well, we'll deal with that if it happens," he said with a small smile.

A bubble of happiness blossomed in my chest and I felt as if a shot of adrenalin just ran through my body. My skin started to prickle and if Dimitri had asked me to run laps, I could have done 100.

As practice progressed, I found myself continually distracted by Dimitri. It seemed that finally having sex with him had not satiated my want for him. On the contrary, it only made me want him more. I kept remembering the feel of his skin on mine and the sound of his breathing in my ear as he whispered he loved me and murmured in Russian. It wasn't that the sex was amazing, because first times hardly ever are, but just being that intimately close to him was enough to make it unbelievable.

We didn't do anything other than stretch and I had a feeling that Dimitri didn't want to ruin this wonderful, happy calm that we were both feeling now. We had finally worked out our futures so that we could be together. There wasn't anything spoiling my mood today.

As practice drew to a close, Alberta came back from the assembly. She and Stan walked over to where Dimitri and I had been stretching and we straightened up.

"So how did training go?" She asked.

"Good," Dimitri said, at the same time that I said "Boring." The lack of privacy and kissing made it very dull even if the conversation was scintillating. She turned to look at Stan for confirmation.

"They just sat in the corner whispering the whole time," he said with a shrug.

"Rose," Alberta looked at me, suddenly serious, "you have progressed very far beyond the rest of your peers."

"Thanks." I smiled at her praise.

"Are you sure that you need to continue these trainings?" She asked both Dimitri and I.

"Why wouldn't we? I may be better than my classmates, but I'm still no match for a strigoi. There's always more to learn," I told her seriously, and secretly I didn't want to give up my Dimitri time. She regarded me with a hint of a smile on her face.

"Who are you and what have you done with the Rose Hathaway that we dragged, kicking and screaming, back from Portland?"

Dimitri put a hand on my head and ruffled my hair. With a cry of indignation, I smacked his hand away and hurriedly smoothed my hair back down. Alberta looked at us sternly. Clearly she didn't approve of the affectionate playing while we were still with Stan.

"Well," Alberta clasped her hands in front of her, "you both should get cleaned up if you want to make it to breakfast."

"Oh good point," I rubbed my stomach, "I'm really hungry."

"You're always hungry," Dimitri pointed out and I bumped my hip into his as we walked out of the gym. Since we were both walking to the same dorm, I got to be alone with him for a few moments as we walked across the quad. I walked close next to Dimitri so no one would hear us talk.

"Did you have any trouble getting back to your room this morning?" He murmured.

"I got stopped by the dorm matron, but I told her that I was trying to do laundry."

He tsked at me.

"What?"

"You're losing your touch, Roza."

"I am not," I huffed, "I was distracted."

"By what?" He asked with a sly smile on his face and I could tell that he enjoyed the fact that I had been thinking about him. I ignored his question.

"So are we going to talk about last night?"

Dimitri sighed and looked away from me. "Rose, what happened last night…"

I stopped dead in my tracks. I couldn't believe he was actually going to deny us after last night. We had worked out our lives together after graduation only 30 minutes ago and here he was stepping back again. I was sick of him telling me no.

Dimitri stopped and turned to look back at me questioningly.

"Oh no you don't!" I jabbed him in the chest with my finger, reminding me of the time when we kissed in the gym over Christmas. "You can't push me away again," I fumed, "not after last night. I don't care if it's only until graduation. Staying apart was hard enough before, but now it'd be damn near impossible."

Dimitri just looked at me patiently until I had finished and gently pushed my hand back down to my side. "You're always poking me when I don't deserve it," he said with a half smile. "What I was going to say was: what happened last night shouldn't have happened." I opened my mouth to protest, but he held up a hand to silence me. "Only because you're not 18 and I'm still your teacher," he continued, "but I don't regret it… I can't. Do you?"

"Of course not. There's no one else I would have rather been with," I said, referring to my first time.

We grinned at each other stupidly like lovesick teenagers. Well, technically I was a lovesick teenager, but Dimitri was a lovesick man.

Suddenly, he reached his hand out and ran it along my cheek and through my hair. "3 weeks until graduation," he sighed. "We can do this."

"And 5 days until my birthday," I reminded him. "So what are you getting me, Comrade?"

He just gave me a look. "Go get ready for class, Rose."

I walked to my dorm with a smirk on my face until I got to my door. There was a white envelope taped to it. It wasn't addressed to anyone so I was immediately on my guard. Peeling it off, I decided that it would be better to open in private no matter what was in it. And I was right.

Inside was a picture of me walking out of the staff wing in Dimitri's clothes. Granted the person who took that photo had no way of knowing who's clothes they were or for sure where I was coming from, but they obviously realized they were someone's clothes that I should not be in because it seemed like they were trying to blackmail me. Sitting down on my bed, I dropped my head into my hands. "Shit!"

**Good news guys! I'm running in the state championship this weekend for track. The season has been a ton of hard work and ive been exhausted like everyday, but it was so worth it. I broke 9 school records and I've been recruited to run in college yayyyyy! I just had to share :]**

**Please review! And Ill try not to ever make you all wait so long again. **

**LLM**


	13. And Then There Was Adrian

**AN: Hi everyone, I'm back! So I know its been a while, but I had been preparing for university for the past few weeks and its finally here. Now that im all moved into my dorm I have same free time so heres the next chapter. **

**Thanks so much for all the reviews and encouragement. You guys are the greatest. **

**Thanks to 4ev3rsilenc3d for the idea to make Adrian and Rose fake date :]**

**Not beta'd because I wanted to post this asap so sorry for any mistakes!**

**I don't own anything except for the idea :]**

After taking what was probably the quickest shower in my life, even faster than all the times I had been late for practice, I grabbed the picture, stuffed it in my pocket and ran to breakfast. I needed to talk to Lissa.

As I walked into the cafeteria, I immediately spotted Lissa's blonde head in line to get food. Ignoring the protests from the people around me, I cut in line behind Lissa.

"Wow, someone must be hungry," she joked, but then she caught sight of my face. "What's wrong, Rose?"

"I need to talk to you," I hissed. We grabbed some food and headed over to our table to meet up with Christian and Adrian. Eddie was conspicuously missing that morning.

After we sat down, I checked the surrounding area to see if any one was watching us and then I slid the picture out on to the table. "This was taped to my door after practice."

They all stared blankly at it for a moment before Christian spoke, "So you're wearing baggy clothes… What's the big deal?"

"The big deal, Christian, is that those clothes are Dimitri's and that is me leaving the staff wing this morning."

Adrian choked on the orange juice that he had been taking a sip of and Lissa let out a small gasp. Christian just sort of looked like he was going to be sick.

"Someone spotted me."

"Well, let's think about this rationally," Lissa said, always the picture of composure, "There's nothing in this picture that shows who's clothes you're wearing."

I gave her a skeptical look. "No matter who's clothes they are, this is still bad. I'm sneaking out of the staff room at 5:30 in the morning in men's clothing… I need to find Dimitri!" I began to scan the cafeteria for him.

"Wait," Lissa cried, "for the moment, Guardian Belikov isn't involved in this and if the person that took this is watching you, if you run up to him right now it was just confirm anything they may have been thinking about the two of you, especially with those Rumors Jesse and Ralf have been spreading."

Accepting defeat, I dropped my head onto the table with a groan. "This is just fucking wonderful."

"Well, I have another bit of good news," Adrian piped up and I turned to look at him form my spot on the table.

"You really cold have been coming back form anywhere and just snuck back into your building though a window in the staff wing because there is less security."

"That's actually pretty brilliant, Adrian," I said, sitting back up.

"I do have my moments," he replied as he leaned back and folded his hands behind his head, clearly pleased with himself.

"The question is, who's room would I have been coming from?"

"Mine," he stated as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Now it was Christian's turn to choke on his juice. "Excuse me?" he spluttered.

"Well, the way I see it," Adrian said leaning forwards, "It needs to be someone you trust, that already knows about you and the cradle robber and won't rat you out." I frowned at Adrian's nickname for Dimitri, but let him keep talking. "Everyone knows that Christian would never cheat on Lissa and Eddie lives in your building so you couldn't be sneaking back form his room and he's having breakfast with Meredith this morning anyways."

As if on cue, all of us whipped our heads towards Meredith's table and sure enough, there was Eddie. "Well that's new," Lissa commented.

Adrian cleared his throat and brought our attention back to him. Focusing on me, he said, "So that just leaves me doesn't it."

"I don't know about this, Adrian." I ran a hand over my hair, nervously.

"Why not? It's perfect."

"Well for one, Dimitri is not going to be happy with this," I said sheepishly.

"It's not like it real or like were actually going to do anything. You're doing it to cover his ass."

"Okay, true," I conceded, "but also…" I peaked at Adrian nervously form under my lashes, "You're sure this won't be hard on you with you're… um… feelings for me?"

It was pretty tactless, but I had to know that he realized what he was trying to get himself into.

His eyes narrowed slightly and I was afraid I had gone too far and pissed him off. But then an easy grin split his face. "Don't you worry about me Little Dhampir. You just get ready for the best fake relationship of your life. I'm going to knock your socks off… hopefully among other things."

"Whoa," I put my hands up to calm him down, "Let's not get carried away…"

"Don't worry, Rose," he said seriously, "I have a plan. Tomorrow I'll make a big public to do about wanting my clothes back, then I'll walk you to class a few times and you can hang out at my suite for a few weeks and then we can 'break-up'."

I looked at Lissa skeptically, but she just grinned at me.

"Okay," I sighed, "Let's do this."

"Excellent!" Adrian grinned as he stood and walked off towards the feeders.

"Why do I feel like he's going to use this as a chance to try and woo me away from Dimitri?"

"Because he is," Christian replied.

"What did I just get myself into?"

Suddenly my afternoon practice with Dimitri couldn't come fast enough.

**AN: so what do you guys think? Any ideas as to who put the picture on Rose's door? Honestly at this point I don't even know so any guesses could turn out to be true. Lemme know who you guys would like to see be the blackmailer. **

**Review! **

**~LLM**


	14. The Geography Classroom

**AN: Hello lovely readers. First I want to profusely apologize for the long long wait. I have this notebook that I write all my chapters in before I type them up and ITS GONE! **

**I think it got lost while I was moving out of my dorm and I had written like two more chapters for this and they disappeared with it. I've been postponing writing anymore hoping that I would find my notebook, but now I have accepted that it's gone and begun to rewrite everything that I had in it. It's pretty heartbreaking for me to lose all that, but there's nothing I can do now. **

**Here's the next chapter. I don't own VA.**

I was silent for the rest of breakfast, but Lissa and Christian didn't push me to join in the conversation. They probably realized that I had a lot to think about. That picture was weighing heavily on my mind and though Adrian's plan was a good one, it seemed to me that at least one person on campus, the one that took the picture, probably knew the truth.

I hated feeling at the mercy of this person. Even if Alberta knew and had accepted it, if this person went to Kirova, everything would probably go to hell.

It seemed like everything in my life had become ruled by things that I couldn't control. This blackmailer, Lissa's darkness… I just couldn't win. At least I didn't have anymore classes and got to get back into field experience today.

At that moment, the bell signaling the start of first period rang and with a sigh, I stood and looked back at Lissa and Christian.

Lissa gave me a small smile, "Everything's going to be okay, Rose."

"Thanks, Liss. You ready, Ozera?" I turned to look at Christian as he leaned in to give Lissa a kiss on the lips.

"Yup," he responded, "lead the way."

A spike of jealousy exploded in my chest as I watched Christian and Lissa kiss each other in public. Part of me knew it was stupid and that If I couldn't have Dimitri there wasn't anyone else I would want, but with the horrible mood I was sinking into, I couldn't fight off the petty emotions.

On our way to Christian's class, I spotted Dimitri ahead of us on the path.

"Christian, I need to talk to Dimtri and you need to come with me," I told him, grabbing him by the arm and dragging him with me.

When we caught up to Dimitri, Christian yanked him arm from my grasp and glared at me, which I ignored. Dimitri raised a questioning eyebrow at us.

"Rose, Mr. Ozera," he greeted us.

Casting a weary glance around us, I started talking in a hushed voice. "Dimitri, I need to talk to you. Not now, but lunchtime, if you're free." I could tell by the concerned look on his face that Dimitri desperately wanted to know what was so important, but he just nodded and told me he'd get a message to me with where to meet him.

Christian's first class, Philosophy, passed by quickly. I took a post at the edge of the room and scanned it religiously. The focus of scanning helped me forget the worry about the picture and how I was going to tell Dimitri about it and Adrian's plan. Unfortunately almost every time I managed to forget, I would see some moroi giving me a dirty look or staring at me while whispering to their neighbor. It was clear that Jesse's rumors had spread and I was sure that once Adrian and I started fake dating they would only get worse. As long as it kept Dimitri safe though, I would deal with it.

When the bell rang, ending class, Christian obviously picked up on my mood and patted me on the shoulder in a rare show of emotion and then he cracked a huge grin.

"What?" I asked.

"I feel bad for any guardian that decides to give you a test today. They won't know what they're getting into."

I let out a laugh and lightly punched Christian in the shoulder. Sometimes he was a lot better than I gave him credit for.

Halfway through the next class, I saw Dimitri stick his head into the room and make eye contact with the teacher. He walked over to her, had a short whispered conversation, handed her a sheet of paper and walked out of the room all without looking at me, which was probably for the best considering all the rumors going around.

"Miss Hathaway," the teacher called. My eyes snapped to the front. "You're afternoon training has been changed. Here are the details." She held out the piece of paper to me and I walked to the front of the room to take it from her.

When I took my spot at the back of the room again, I opened the paper up. The only words on it were "Room 215" and I silently thanked Dimitri for finding us an empty place to meet. After shoving the note in my pocket, I went back to scanning the room and the rest of the morning went by without event.

When the bell rang for lunch Christian sidled up next to me and whispered, "So you going to meet Belikov?"

Looking around quickly to make sure no one was listening, I replied, "Yeah, but after I grab some food. I'm ravenous."

"I'm not surprised at all," Christian joked.

As we exited the classroom, I was shocked to see Adrian waiting for me.

"Little Dhampir!" He called, "How was your morning, love?"

I did my best not to act surprised at the endearment and let him grab ahold of my hand. Cutting to the chase, I told him I was about to go meet Dimitri to tell him about our plan and Adrian put on a fake frown.

"How can I be the perfect fake boyfriend if you won't even let me eat lunch with you?" He pouted.

"You'll have plenty of time for that once I give Dimitri a heads up"

But Adrian wouldn't be dissuaded. He accompanied me though the lunch line as I grabbed a BLT for the walk over and leaned in for a kiss on the cheek when I left the room. It made me uneasy letting him hold my hand and such without Dimitri okaying this first so I quickly made my way over to room 215 which turned out to be a geography classroom that I vaguely remembered from my freshman year.

Dimitri had been studying a world map hanging on the wall when I walked in, but turned to face me at the sound of the door opening. "I was beginning to think that you had stood me up," he said as I shoved the last bite of BLT in my mouth, "but I should have known that you'd need food first."

If I wasn't so nervous about the conversation we were about to have I would have laughed, and Dimitri immediately noticed.

"What did you need to talk to me about, Roza?" he asked, sobering.

The sound of my Russian name made the butterflies in my stomach go crazy, but I didn't let it distract me.

"This morning, I found this taped to my door this morning after practice." I gingerly placed the folded picture in his hand.

He unfolded it and immediately froze. His eyes grew wide and snapped up to mine and I could tell he was trying not to panic.

"Before you freak out, It's not as bad as it seems," and I explained to him about Lissa's observations about the picture. "But we thought with Jesse's rumors going around, we, well actually, Adrian, came up with a plan to draw attention away from you and make who ever sent this think that these are someone else's clothes."

"Please wait until I explain everything before you say anything, because I know you aren't going to like it."

Dimitri's frown deepened and the moment I finished explaining he burst out, "No! Absolutely not!"

"Why does it need to be Adrian?" He asked.

"He's the only one that makes sense!"

"I don't like him and his feelings for you"

I took Dimitri's hands in mine and smiled up at him. "It's cute when you're protective, but there's nothing to worry about."

Instead of calming down like I expected him to, he ripped his hands out of mine.

"No, Rose. There are a lot of things to worry about. Ivashkov is an entitled royal moroi who is just going to try and use you!"

"He wouldn't do that!" I shouted back.

"You don't know that, Rose! Every moroi is nice until he gets what he wants!" Dimitri looked livid, more mad that I had ever seen him and I had no idea why.

"Until he gets what he wants? What does that mean?" I put my hands on my hips and took a step back from him. "You don't trust me?"

"No, of course I trust you. It's him I don't trust."

"Well it sure doesn't sound that way!" I stomped across the room, putting as much space between us as possible and found myself facing the map that Dimitri had been looking at earlier. Trying to calm myself down, I busied myself trying to locate Siberia on the map, which was harder than I thought considering the only thing I knew about it was that it was vaguely near Russia.

After a few moments I felt Dimitri's arms wrap around my waist. I let him do it, but didn't melt into them as I normally would. His comments were still eating at me.

"Roza, I know Adrian is your friend, but I have more experience with moroi men than you do. I know how they get when they want something."

As I stared at the outline of Siberia, I suddenly realized why Dimitri was so worried about Adrian and I. He was remembering how his father treated his mother. I placed my hands on top of Dimtri's and brought one to my lips.

"Dimitri," I said, still staring at the map, "Adrian is not your father."

I felt him stiffen against my back and I held my breath, wondering if I had said the wrong thing. After a few tense moments, I felt him drop his face into my hair and he let out a harsh breath.

"I know, Rose, I know."

I turned in his arms and placed my hands on his cheeks. "I knew you wouldn't like this plan," I told him, "But it was the only thing that would save us both from a world of trouble. Adrian's just trying to help, Comrade. Try not to be to hard on him."

Dimitri gave me a soft smile. "Since when are you the level headed one?" he asked.

"Oh, just since I fell in love with this amazing guy," I said with a wink and I bumped my hip into his. He pulled me into his side and tucked me under his arm.

"So I've been thinking," Dimitri started, staring intently at the map. His accent was coming out more strongly than usual and I could tell that he was nervous. "After you graduate and we both get our assignments, while The Princess and Mr. Ozera are settling into court, we should take some time off. There's someplace that I want to take you."

I looked up at him, fighting back a smile. "Really? Where to?"

He reached forward and traced his finger lovingly across the outline of Siberia. "To meet my family."

"Are you serious?" I managed to choke out.

"Don't you want to?" He looked down at me, his eyes warm.

The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to meet them. I knew that nothing was more important to Dimitri than his family and I desperately wanted to know them, but I had an unshakable feeling that they wouldn't approve of me.

What family would be okay with their only son putting his career at risk of a 17-year-old run away with no respect for authority? This was another one of those times when I felt completely inadequate to ever be Dimitri's girlfriend. I would never be an ideal choice for him and I was sure his family would notice.

"Roza, what are you thinking about?" Dimitri's rich voice pulled me out of my thoughts.

"I don't think they're gonna like me," I told him while looking at a spot somewhere over his shoulder.

"What do you mean? Of course they will," he protested.

"Come on, Dimitri," I sighed, finally making eye contact with him. "Do you think that a 17-year-old runaway brat is anything like the girlfriend they imagined for you?"

Dimitri took my face between his hands. "Roza, those things do not define who you are. My family will love you simply because I love you." He kissed me lightly on the nose and I could feel a smile beginning to spread across my face.

"You think so?"

"I know so." Dimitri leaned down to kiss me and I let my eyes fall closed. I don't think he meant for the kiss to get so heated, but sometimes when were around each other there just isn't anything you can do about it.

Wanting to get closer to him, I dragged him by the shirt over to the teachers' desk and hopped on top of it. Now I was at the perfect height to wrap my legs around his waist. His hands made their way to the edge of my shirt and slid underneath it. Feeling his hands on my bare skin sent a flash of heat across my body.

Ignoring the fact that we were in a public classroom in the middle of lunch period, I grabbed the hem of his shirt and pulled it over his head, dropping it somewhere on the floor next to us. My shirt soon followed and Dimitri removed his lips from mine, only to use them to explore the newly uncovered skin of my chest. I wound my fingers into his hair and let my head fall back in happiness.

All the crap that was going on in this school seemed distant, when Dimitri was kissing me like this and I knew we were going to have time alone in Russia together. Jesse and Ralf and their stupid rumors were the farthest thing from my mind at that moment.

As Dimiri brought his lips back to mine, he began to reach for the button of my jeans. We were going to have sex on a teacher's desk in a classroom. It was probably the most kinky and clichéd thing that I could think of, but at that point I honestly didn't care. Before I could stop it, a small moan escaped my mouth, but it only seemed to spur Dimitri on. He pulled me roughly against and…

The school bell rang loudly through out the room and we both jumped apart. Dimitri cursed in Russian and immediately grabbed his shirt off the floor before handing me mine.

"We shouldn't have done that," he said uneasily, "anyone could have walked in."

Instead of responding, I just smiled at him, my chest still heaving.

"What?" he asked.

"We almost got it on on top of some poor teachers desk," I said. And with that both of us were bent over at the waists, laughing until we couldn't breath.

"I'll see you later, Comrade," I said as I finally caught my breath, "it's time to go find Ozera."

**AN: well im finally back. Im so sorry for those of you that have been waiting and waiting for an update, I hope this will suffice. I made it super long to make up for it. **

**I wish I knew where my journal was.**

**This wasn't edited, sorry!**

**Cheers, LLM**


	15. He's SO 24

**AN: Hey guys long time no see. First let me say, IM SO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG! Ive been getting messages and reviews asking when I was going to update and im sorryyyyy it took so long. This semester was hell on wheels between class, my job, practice, trying to qualify for nationals, and a death in the family that I really had no time or desire to write. But hey its summer so expect more updates! I seriously love everyone who ready this story, it means so much to me! **

The halls were already filling with people when I ducked out of the geography class room and I quickly made my way towards Christian's 5th period class. That last thing I needed today was to get in trouble for not being with my moroi. I ran into him halfway to his cooking class and was surprised to see Adrian at his side.

"Little Dhamphir!" He greeted me and slung an arm around my shoulder, "Did you get a chance to talk to the Cradle Robber?"

I jammed an elbow into Adrian's side at the sound of Cradle Robber. He grunted in discomfort, but didn't complain.

"He was not happy," I told Adrian, "Boy, you should have seen his face." I shook my head, remembering how Dimitri had blown up at the first mention of Adrian's plan.

Adrian snorted. "Who cares if he's not happy with it, we're saving his ass."

"The point is," I reiterated with a glare, "he agreed to let us try this for a few weeks so we can deflect attention away from me and him."

A grin spread across Adrian's face, "So Rose Hathaway is my girlfriend?"

"Fake girlfriend", I clarified.

Adrian waved a hand in the air in front of him, "Yeah, yeah, technicalities."

Christian and I made glanced at each other and rolled our eyes. I knew exactly what Christian was thinking because I was thinking the same thing… This was going to be a long few weeks.

"So Little Dhampir, can I buy you dinner tonight?" Adrian asked, oblivious to Christian and I's thoughts.

"If it saves me from eating cafeteria food, sure thing, Ivashkov."

"Come to my room at 8," Adrian said as he grabbed a hold of my hand and kissed my cheek, "Have a good time in class!"

Once Adrian was out of earshot, I turned to Christian and sighed, "this is going to be an interesting night".

When we entered Christian's cooking class, the other dhampirs and I decided how we were going to guard the room and took up our posts. A couple morois gave me dirty looks, but none of them had even been my friend to begin with so I didn't let it bother me.

About halfway through class, I saw a flicker of black flash by one of the windows and my body immediately tensed. My eyes scanned the room, hastily. I made eye contact with another novice, Wes, across the room and from his tense stance, I could tell that he had seen the fake strigoi as well. At first I wasn't sure if our room was the target or not, but as soon as I saw another body all in black stop outside a window, I knew we were in for an attack.

There were still a few novices that hadn't pulled their stakes out yet, so at the risk of panicking the moroi, I raised to fingers to my mouth and whistled as loud as I could. Everyone in the room froze and looked in my direction, even the teacher. The dhampirs, seeing my stake at the ready, pulled theirs out too, but just continued to look at me. I was quickly getting frustrated at their lack of action, but suddenly I realized that they were waiting for instructions.

"Absolutely ridiculous", I thought to myself. Sure, I was the most experienced novice in the room, but these novices needed to know how to organize themselves without a leader. Shaking off my annoyance, I started going through what I had learned in class and from Dimitri, as quickly as I could.

"All the moroi in the center of the room," I called out and no one hesitated in following my direction. I hoped I had made the right choice and hadn't just sent a roomful of moroi to their fake deaths.

"Novices, fan out! Two by the door, one by each window and the rest surrounding the moroi."

I took a position in front of the group of moroi facing the door. The tension in the room was palpable and everyone seemed to be holding their breath. A rush of adrenalin shot through my body as I saw the door handle begin to turn, and I gripped by stake even tighter.

The door flew open with a bang and two masses of black flew into the room. I immediately recognized one of them as Dimitri by his height. The other man was quite large in his own right, but not as tall as Dimitri. He wasn't a guardian that I recognized, but under the circumstances, I couldn't bring myself to care. As soon as Dimitri and the other man were engaged with novices, the windows slammed open and four smaller guardians dressed in all black jumped into the room.

Soon almost every novice in the room was engaged with fighting a guardian. Yuri had come in through one of the windows closest to me and as soon as her feet hit the ground, I rushed her. I slammed her into the wall, but Yuri just used the wall as leverage to push me away from her. As Yuri and I began exchanging blows, I started analyzing every opening I could force my way into to try and stake her.

Just as Yuri landed a kick to my ribs, Meredith snuck up behind her and grabbed her around the neck. As Yuri tried to pry Meredith's arm from her throat, I leapt forward and staked her. Yuri stepped to the side and I immediately started scanning the room again, ready to leap back into action.

I quickly spotted Emile yanking a moroi out of the circle. Running forward, I wasted no time in jamming my rubber stake into her back while she was distracted by her struggling moroi.

The rest of the fights around the room seemed to be going well until my eyes landed on Dimitri. His reach was so long that none of the novices could get close enough to try and stake him. A novice that Dimitri had just kicked onto the floor locked eyes with me and shouted, "Help us, Rose!" but he was too late, I was already moving.

I saw Dimitri start to turn to look for me, but it didn't matter. I took a running leap onto his back and wrapped my legs around his waist. Grabbing his neck, I leaned back as far as I could to try and pull him off balance, but he was too strong. I felt one of Dimitri's huge hands in my hair, pulling me forwards, to loosen the pressure on his neck. Grabbing my hair was just playing dirty on his part, but I didn't let it distract me.

Instead, I took one of my arms from around his neck and jammed my elbow into his shoulder. This made him release my hair, but he just grabbed my shoulders instead and pulled me over his head as if I weighed nothing, and threw me onto the floor. I landed roughly on my back, but leapt right back onto my feet.

Dimitri was fending off three novices at once, like the Godlike fighter he was, and none could make it past the reach of his arms to stake him, because as soon as they stepped in range, he struck out and knocked them right back again. It looked like I wasn't going to be getting much help in this fight. How was it that it always came down to Dimitri and I?

"Keep Attacking!" I called to the other novices as I advanced on Dimitri. From all our practices, I had learned exactly how to slip past his defenses and dodge Dimitri's long arm swings. Every time Dimitri would turn his focus to keeping me from getting too close, the other novices would dive in and attempt to grab a hold of one of his arms or torso.

Soon enough we became too much for Dimitri to handle and I was able to slip my stake towards his chest. As soon as the tip touched his heart, Dimitri stopped fighting and I dropped back to scan the room. Everything was over. The guardians were standing against the walls and the moroi were standing in the middle of the room, in a slight state of shock.

Alberta, who has been taking notes on a clipboard from the doorway, gave us a thumbs up and said "good job, everyone!"

The novices all looked at each other and grinned, breathing heavily, while the moroi started to cheer. I locked eyes with Dimitri and couldn't help but think how gorgeous he looked all sweaty and disheveled. His chest was heaving as he put his arms on top of his head. A small half smile flitted across his face and his eyes slid down my body. I shivered under his gaze and looked away before I did something stupid.

At that moment, the moroi teacher called the class back to order and I made my way back to my position by the wall. Christian gave me a huge grin when I walked by and I winked at him. The rest of the class passed by quickly. Everyone was too keyed up to pay attention and the moroi were reliving the battle in hushed whispers while the teacher lectured. When the bell rang, Christian ruffled my hair as we walked out.

"Watching you fight almost makes me wish that you were my guardian," he joked, "almost."

"Please," I scoffed, "you won't need me."

"Why?" He asked, "because my fire skills are so badass?"

"No," I replied without thinking, "because you'll have Dimitri."

"I… What?" Christian spluttered, "I thought he was one of Lissa's guardians."

"Well, we can't guard the same person if we're together, so he's asking to be transferred to you." I glanced towards Christian and his face was still stuck in a mask of shock.

When he finally spoke, he said, "I didn't think I was getting a guardian."

"Please," I punched him gently in the arm, "Like Liss would ever let you out in the world without one."

At that moment Adrian sidled up to us and threw an arm around me.

"Little Dhampir!" he greeted me and planted a kiss on my cheek. "What are you all sweaty?" he asked, looking me up and down.

"Guardian attack in the last class." I awkwardly put an arm around Adrian's waist, trying to sell our fake relationship and he raised an eyebrow at my hesitation.

Because it was break time, and relatively nice outside for a Montana spring, a lot of people were milling around the quad. Adrian, noticing the crowd, looked at me and winked before clapping his hands together loudly.

"Rose, I almost forgot!" he said dramatically, "I need those clothes back I leant you the other night." He grinned, slyly at me, making the innuendo behind his words very clear. I knew exactly what Adrian was doing, trying to take suspicion off Dimitri and I, but I blushed at all the people around me, now thinking that I had slept with Adrian.

"Yeah, sorry," I told him, "I'll bring them when I come over tonight."

"Thanks, love." He gave me a gentle kiss on the forehead.

As Adrian pulled back, I glanced over his shoulder and noticed Dimitri cutting across the quad with a stormy look on his face.

"Shit," I whispered and Adrian turned to follow my gaze.

"Don't worry about him, Little Dhampir. He knows why were doing this and he'll come around," he whispered.

"I hope so," I murmured back.

Adrian put a finger under my chin and grinned at me, trying to take my mind off of Dimitri, "I'll see you later Little Dhampir!" He flashed me a smile and left Christian and I alone to head off t our next class.

When classes finished for the day, I left Christian with Lissa and Eddie in the library with permission from Alberta and made my way to the gym for training with Dimitri. When I arrived, it was still empty, so I ducked into the locker room to change into my practice clothes. Just as I pulled my sports bra over my head, I heard the locker room door creak open.

"Roza?" Dimitri's accented voice rang through the room.

"Back here," I called to him.

"I saw your bag," he said by way of an explanation. I searched his face for signs of the anger I saw earlier on the quad, but found none.

"So you heard I'm going to Adrian's tonight?" I asked nervously, glancing up at him from under my lashes.

"I heard," I told me, brushing a lock of hair back from my face. His face was completely blank except for a soft smile.

"You're okay with this right?"

"Well, I would much rather you come over to my place, but I understand," he ran a down my arm until he was grasping my hand. He pulled me closer to him and rested his other hand on my lower back. "But," Dimitri said with a sly grin, "I do want to give you a taste of what you're missing tonight."

I felt my mouth drop open in shock. Dimitri Belikov, stoic badass guardian, so self-controlled that sometimes I questions whether or not he still had human emotions, was putting the moves on me in the locker room. Before I could get a word out, he pulled me against him and pressed his lips to mine.

I immediately opened by mouth to him and responded enthusiastically. Without warning, Dimitri turned me and pushed me up against the lockers. His hand on my lower back slid down until it was cupping my butt and he squeezed. Despite my surprise, I let out a small moan to let Dimitri know that I liked it. Wanting him closer, I picked one of my legs off the floor and wrapped it around his waist, pulling his hips into mine. Dimitri responded by leaning into me and breaking his lips away from mine. The look he gave me then could only be described as pure passion and I loved it.

Breaking eye contact, he leaned down and began to place wet, open-mouthed kisses along my neck. Threading my fingers into his hair, I leaned my head back to give him more access. When his mouth reached my edge of my sports bra, pulled it down slightly and bit down on my skin. I knew it would leave a mark, but at least Dimitri had the good sense to do it in a place that no one would see.

Dragging his lips back up to mine, I tried to lean in and kiss him again, but Dimitri stayed just out of my reach. I tried again, leaning towards him, but as soon as my lips brushed his, he pulled back again.

I made a sound of annoyance in the back of my throat, but he just chuckled. I think he was enjoying teasing me. Finally, Dimitri leaned in slowly, barely brushing his lips against mine. I held my breath, waiting to see if he was going to pull away again, but instead, he grabbed my face and pushed his lips hard against mine, kissing me until I was gasping for breath.

And then abruptly, he was gone. My eyes stayed closed for a few seconds as my brain caught up to what had just happened. Finally, my eyes fluttered open and I looked around for Dimitri and I tried to slow down my breathing. All I saw was the door floating closed as his voice floated back through it saying, "Time for practice, Rose!"

After a few seconds of frozen silence, I burst out laughing, the type of laughing that makes your cheeks hurt. Dimitri was young as far as guardians went, but people, including myself, always forgot that because of how focused and serious he was about his job. But this was one of those rare moments that only I got to see, where Dimitri was _**so**_ 24.

**I was going to make this longer, but I didn't want to wait to post any longer so the first fake date with Adrian will be next chapter! Review pleaseee!**

**3 LLM **


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